PHP conditional statment inside a function - php

Question

I am trying to create function that takes two arguments one for the user input and the other a message for error. I initially have an associative array with the two input fields and the corresponding error.
When the function is submitted without any entry I get two similar output; I thought I would get 'test1' and 'test2'. I am passing different arguments each time but I get the same result. The code is below
$valid = TRUE;
//$errors='';
$errors=array('desc_error'=>'please enter valid description',
'title_error'=>'provide valid title','no_error'=>'',);
function sanitizeText($input,$error){
//$input;
if($input!='')
{
$input= filter_var($input, FILTER_SANITIZE_STRING);
if($input==''){
global $errors;
$errors[$error];
$valid=FALSE;
return $errors[$error];
}
else{
$input;
echo 'test 1';
return $input;
}
}
else if($input=='')
{
if($input==$_POST['desc'])
{
echo 'the description field is required<br/>';
$valid=FALSE;
}
else{
//
}
}
}
if(isset($_POST['submit']))
{
$title=sanitizeText($_POST['title'],'title_error');
$desc=sanitizeText($_POST['desc'],'desc_error');
}
?>
<form method="post" action="">
<p>Book Title:<input type="text" name="title" maxlength="100" value=""/></p>
<p>Desc:<input type="text" name="desc" maxlength="100" value=""/></p>
<p><input type="submit" name="submit" value="Submit"/></p>
</form>

Answer 1

I think you are trying to validate form using php you can also user javascript to validate but to do it using php please refer following links.
http://myphpform.com/required-optional-fields.php
http://coredogs.com/lesson/form-and-php-validation-one-page
http://www.phpf1.com/tutorial/php-form.html?page=3
and
http://www.montanaprogrammer.com/php-web-programming/php-form-validation/

Answer 2

Your code does not make sense logic wise. Firstly, you check if $input is an empty string, or is not, and then within that first check.. you again make the same exact check. Since ifs are evaluated in order, and input is not ever going to be an empty string, the first if will always execute.
Then, your first 'else'; it will only execute if the $input variable is an empty string.. I can sort of see what you're attempting to do, but it won't work as it is right now. In order for it to work, it would have to look something like the below:
function sanitizeText($input,$error) {
global $errors;
global $valid;
$input_val = filter_var($_POST[$input], FILTER_SANITIZE_STRING);
if ($input_val != '') {
$valid = TRUE;
return $input;
}
else if ($input_val == '') {
$valid = FALSE;
echo $errors[$error].'<br />';
}
}
if(isset($_POST['submit']))
{
$title=sanitizeText('title','title_error');
$desc=sanitizeText('desc','desc_error');
}
If the input value is not an empty string, it will return the input value. If it is, it will not return anything and will instead echo the appropriate error.