Trying to create a login form/certain aspects I don't fully understand

[Livelonger87]

Hey, I've been learning PHP for roughly a week now and have been creating a forum with it (ambitious project)

 

However, I'm stuck on understanding how a login page functions.  Originally I was struggeling with the registration page but have now gained the understanding of it.  However, I have searched online for tutorials for the reason being: Gaining the understanding. 

 

Anyway, I have been using a login script I had found (Won't post here due to it's size).  However, I struggle to understand certain aspects....

 

if(isset($_COOKIE['anarchyaiiight']))
(!get_magic_quotes_gpc()) 
$_POST['uname'] = stripslashes($_POST['uname']);

Anyway, I'm not sure how to get a create_topic.php page to gather a username from the cookie for itself to submit to the MySQL database for it to appear as the original topic creator

[corillo181]

so your problems is understanding cookies at the moment?

[Livelonger87]

so your problems is understanding cookies at the moment?

 

Pretty much, yeah.  I'm trying to figure out how to get one to follow onto another page so I can gather the user's username.