Using PHP variables on multiple pages

Question

Is it possible to use a variable from one page in a piece of code on another? e.g. submit a form on one page and on the second page use a PHP script to add the data from the form to a MySQL table

Thanks for all the help

Answer 1

This is what the GET and POST 'super' globals are for. http://www.tizag.com/phpT/postget.php

Answer 2

The script that generates the form does not have to be the script the processes the form. all it takes is for the FORM tag to point to the correct script. The only caveat is that whatever page you submit the form data to also has to then generate some suitable output (unless you do a AJAX POST).

If you're instead asking if two page executions can handle the same POSTed data, well that is quite a different question. At a simplistic level, you can have the first include() the second so it has access to all the same data. A bit more advanced is to re-create the original POST and synthesize a POST. This will probably require some JavaScript assistance. Another approach is to use PHP's session feature and put the value aside so a later script has access to it. This relies on the user then following the correct link, however!

Answer 3

Your best bet would be to use PHP's session functions. That way if the user navigates away from your page and then comes back, the session variables will still be there (provided the session hasn't expired). You can get more information here -- PHP Sessions. Basically all you have to do is call

session_start();

at the top of each php page (before anything is outputted to the browser) where you want to have access to the session variables. You can then set/retrieve a variable using

// set
$_SESSION['varname'] = "something";
// retrieve
$somevar = $_SESSION['varname'];