Problems posting data into json url - php

Question

Hey I'm sure this is an easy fix but it's driving me nuts.
I'm working with the youtube api and I'm trying to post a user generated search term into the url like so:
<form action="pagination.php" method="post">
<input style="width:50%" type="text" name="search_term">
<input type="submit" value="Submit">
</form>
<?
$search_term = $_POST['search_term'];
$ch = curl_init();
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, 'http://gdata.youtube.com/feeds
/api/videos?q='.$search_term.'&safeSearch=none&orderby=viewCount&v=2&alt=json&start-
index=75&max-results=50');
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HEADER, 0);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_TIMEOUT, 10);
$output = curl_exec($ch);
curl_close($ch);
$data = json_decode($output,true);
$info = $data["feed"];
$video = $info["entry"];
$nVideo = count($video);
echo "<ul style='float:right'>";
foreach($video as $video) {
echo '<img src="'.$video['media$group']['media$thumbnail'][0]['url'].'"><br><br>';
$title = $video['title']['$t'];
$video_id = $video['media$group']['yt$videoid']['$t'];
echo ''.$title.'';
echo '<br>';
When I run this code nothing happens, however if I manually assign a value to $search_term like this:
$search_term = 'baseball';
everything works perfectly.
Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Answer 1

I found some syntax errors.
The following code works for me.
NOTE: The change of the filename so you can test this file and update the code in your own file.
Maybe on purpose, but at start it will always do a retrieve with "no terms", since the code is executed.
ENTER terms and press Submit button
<form action="ytcurltest1.php" method="post">
<input style="width:50%" type="text" name="search_term">
<input type="submit" value="Submit">
</form>
<?PHP
$search_term = $_POST['search_term'];
$startIndex = 1;
$maxResults = 25;
$ch = curl_init();
$url = 'http://gdata.youtube.com/feeds/api/videos?q='
. $search_term
. '&safeSearch=none&orderby=viewCount&v=2&alt=json'
. '&start-index=' . $startIndex
. '&max-results=' . $maxResults;
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL,$url);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HEADER, 0);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true);
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_TIMEOUT, 10);
$output = curl_exec($ch);
curl_close($ch);
$data = json_decode($output,true);
if ( count($data) == 0 )
{
echo 'NO RESULTS FOUND. ENTER other terms';
RETURN;
}
$info = $data["feed"];
$video = $info["entry"];
$nVideo = count($video);
echo "<ul style='float:right'>";
foreach ($video as $video)
{
echo '<img src="'.$video['media$group']['media$thumbnail'][0]['url']
.'"><br><br>';
$title = $video['title']['$t'];
$video_id = $video['media$group']['yt$videoid']['$t'];
echo ''.$title.'';
echo '<br>';
}
?>