Will a disabled text field submit when a form is POSTed?

Question

If I submit a disabled text field via POST, what will the resulting value be on the action page?

For example, I have:

<table border=0 cellpadding=4 cellspacing=0>
<tr><td>
   <input type="checkbox" id="chk_$item" 
    onClick="javascript:handleClick('$item')">
</td><td>
   <input type="text" id="txt_$item" name="addresses[]" value="$item">
</td></tr>
<tr><td>
   ...etc...
</td></tr>
</table>

the handleClick() javascript function checks if chk_$item is checked, if not, it disables the txt_$item text field.

When I submit it, all of the text fields go to an addresses[] array in a PHP script.

But, can I prevent the field from submitting anything if it is disabled? Will it do this by default? If not, how should I change the behavior? (I really don't want to clear the fields when they get disabled).

Answer 1

Disabled inputs will not be submitted with the form; that's part of the defined behavior of disabled, cf. W3C HTML 4.01 Form docs.

Answer 2

If you don't want it changed, make it readonly.