Using PHP $_POST to remember a option in a select box? - php

Question

I have a form which POSTs to itselft so the user can do things that you would find in a Shopping Cart.
e.g. Increase quantity, select postage type.
My problem is for my form Select element called "postage" whenever the form reloads itself , it forgets what was selected.
All my other fields remember their values using this:
<input type="text" name="postcode" value="<?php echo $_POST['postcode']; ?> " />
How do I use the $_POST value to automatically select the option in the select field that was done by the user?
I tried this:
<select name="postage" selected="<?php echo $_POST['postage']; ?>" >
and this
<select name="postage" value="<?php echo $_POST['postage']; ?>" >
Thanks

Answer 1

You almost got it. You need to set the attribute selected="selected" (the exact form you need technically depends on your HTML doctype, but this is a safe default) on the <option> element if and only if the value of $postage equals the value of the element. So:
<select name="postage">
<option value="foo"
<?php if ($_POST['postage'] == "foo") echo 'selected="selected" '; ?>
>
</select>
Note that this violates the DRY principle because you now have two occurrences of the string "foo" in there, so it's a prime candidate for refactoring. A good approach would be to keep value/text pairs in an array and iterate over it with foreach to produce the <option> tags.

Answer 2

You need to foreach through all the options.
Make an array with all the dropdown options, loop through that, and compare with what is stored in post.
E.G.:
<?php
$aDropd = array("apple","orange","banana");
echo "<select>";
foreach($aDropd as $sOption){
$sSel = ($sOption == $_POST['postage'])? "Selected='selected'":"";
echo "<option $sSel>$sOption</option>";
}
echo "</select>";

Answer 3

no its not working at all..you need to put some kind of loop for that.
For Example : foreach($record => $values){
if($values == $_POST['postage']){
$selected = "selected='selected' ";
}else{
$selected = "";
}
}
<input name="postage" value="1" <?=$selected?> >
EDITED:
if($_POST['postage'] == 1){
$selected1 = "selected='selected' ";
}else if($_POST['postage'] == 2){
$selected2 = "selected='selected' ";
} and so on..........
<select name="postage">
<option value="1" <?=$selected1;?> />
<option value="2" <?=$selected2;?> />
</select>
I think this may be helpful to you..you can ask me if anything else needed...
Thanks.

Answer 4

The value of selected should be selected
<select name="postage" value="1" <?php echo (($_POST['postage'] == 1)?'selected="selected"':''); ?> >

Answer 5

Your html syntax is wrong. The correct way to write the html is like this:
<select>
<option value ="<?php echo $_POST['postage']; ?>" selected="selected"></option>
</select>

Answer 6

You can also make it shorter:
<select>
<option value ="<?=$_POST['postage']; ?>" selected="selected"></option>
</select>

Answer 7

<select name="foo">
<option value="1" <?php echo strcmp($_POST['foo'],"1")==0?"selected=\"selected\"":"" ?>>option1</option>
<option value="2" <?php echo strcmp($_POST['foo'],"2")==0?"selected=\"selected\"":"" ?>>option2</option>