PHP - Getting back Post from forEach select form - php

Question

i have a website where the admin can choose to add a certain number of bbcode tags and the corresponding html tags.
First he chooses how many tags he wants to add from a drop down select form in a for Each loop.
Depending on how many tags he chose when he clicked the submit button, the corresponding number of input tags appear in a second form, also in a for Each loop. He fills in the bbcode and html input and clicks the submit button. Normally the tags should be added to my database but in this case when he clicks submit the form disappears and nothing is added..
Here is the code :
//FIRST FORM WHERE HE DECIDES HOW MANY TAGS TO ADD
<form id='nbbalises' action='config.ini.php' method='post' accept-charset='UTF-8'>
<fieldset>
<legend>How many tags ?</legend>
<input type='hidden' name='submitted' id='submitted' value='1' />
<?php
echo '<select name="number">';
$range = range(1,50,1);
foreach ($range as $nb) {
echo "<option value='$nb'>$nb</option>";
}
echo "</select>";
?>
<input type='submit' name='Submit' value='Submit' />
</fieldset>
</form><br /> <br />
<?php
if (!(empty($_POST['number']))) {
if ($_POST['number'] >= 1 && $_POST['number']<= 50){
$number = $_POST['number'];
$range2 = range(1,$number,1);
?>
//SECOND FORM WHERE I GENERATE THE INPUT DEPENDING ON THE NUMBER CHOSEN FROM FIRST FORM
<form id='balises' action='config.ini.php' method='post' accept-charset='UTF-8'>
<fieldset>
<legend>Balises bbc : </legend>
<input type='hidden' name='submitted' id='submitted' value='1' />
<?php
foreach ($range2 as $nb2) {
echo "<label>bbcode tag $nb2 :</label>
<input type='text' size='40' name='bbc$nb2' id='bbc$nb2' maxlength='40' />
<label>html tag $nb2 :</label>
<input type='text' size='40' name='html$nb2' id='html$nb2' maxlength='40' />
<br />";
}
}
?>
<input type='submit' name='Submit2' value='Submit2' />
</fieldset>
</form>
<?php
//PROBLEM STARTS HERE, NOTHING WORKS UNDER HERE
if (isset($_POST['Submit2'])){
//CONNECT TO MY DATABASE
connectDB();
for ($i=0; $i<$number ; $i++){
if (!(empty($_POST["bbc$i"])) && (empty($_POST["html$i"])))
//FUNCTION ADDS TAGS TO DATABASE
addBbc($_POST["bbc$i"], $_POST["html$i"]);
}
mysql_close();
}
}
//MY FUNCTIONS TO ADD THE BBCODE AND HTML TO DATABASE
function connectDB(){
//connexion DB
$link = mysql_connect('127.0.0.1', 'USERNAME', 'PASSWORD');
if (!$link) {
die('Erreur de connexion: ' . mysql_error());
}
$db = mysql_select_db('1213he200967',$link) or die("N'a pu selectionner
1213he200967");
mysql_query("SET NAMES 'utf8'");
}
function addBbc($bbc, $html){
$b = mysql_real_escape_string($bbc);
$h = mysql_real_escape_string($html);
$query="INSERT INTO bbcode (BBC,HTML) VALUES ('$b','$h')";
$result = mysql_query($query) or die("error");
if (!$result) {
$message = 'Invalid query: ' . mysql_error() . "\n";
die($message);
return false;
}
else return true;
}
Thank you very much, and sorry if my code is amateur-ish, i'm only starting in php.
EDIT
Found part of my problem
$number = $_POST['number'];
$range2 = range(1,$number,1);
This goes from 1 to the number chosen by the user in the first form.
for ($i=0; $i<$number ; $i++){
if (!(empty($_POST["bbc$i"])) && (empty($_POST["html$i"])))
//FUNCTION ADDS TAGS TO DATABASE
addBbc($_POST["bbc$i"], $_POST["html$i"]);
This goes from 0 to $number - 1
So i changed my code to this.
for ($i=0; $i<$number ; $i++){
$nb = $i + 1;
if (!(empty($_POST["bbc$nb"])) && (empty($_POST["html$nb"]))) {
addBbc($_POST["bbc$nb"], $_POST["html$nb"]);
}
else echo "$nb tags empty ";
This works a bit better but now it goes to the else just here above and displays "2 tags empty", so it still doesn't quite work.

Answer 1

Ok to solve it I finally decided to post the data from the second form to another page and i modified my code to this.
for ($i=0; $i<$number ; $i++){
$nb = $i + 1;
$varBbc = 'bbc'.$nb;
$varHtml = 'html'.$nb;
if ((isset($_POST[$varBbc])) && (isset($_POST[$varHtml]))) {
addBbc($varBbc, $varHtml);
}
else echo "$nb tags empty ";
}
Apparently using !empty instead of isset doesn't work in this case, maybe because of the html tags.

Answer 2

$nb should be in double quotes.
so echo "<option value='$nb'>$nb</option>"
change to echo "<option value='".$nb."'>$nb</option>";
and also
if (!(empty($_POST['number']))) {
if ($_POST['number'] >= 1 && $_POST['number']<= 50){
$number = $_POST['number'];
$range2 = range(1,$number,1);
?>
change to:
if (isset($_POST['submit'])) {
if ($_POST['number'] >= 1 && $_POST['number']<= 50){
$number = $_POST['number'];
$range2 = range(1,$number,1);
?>