Form submission fails when hitting ENTER instead of clicking submit button...

[Rottingham]

This is one of those bazaar problems that you wrack your brain over and can't figure out, only to realize it's incredibly stupid and simple!

 

I have a form for searching customers in a custom app for a security company. Strangely, when you enter some text into the keywords field and hit enter, it returns to the search form page, meaning the script doesn't realize it is a submission. It knows this by checking

 

if( isset( $_REQUEST["submit"] ) )
    ....

 

When you enter the text and click the Search button, it works perfectly. When hitting enter in the text field, it acts like $_REQUEST doesn't receive the form. The code is like such: ( although

 

switch( $_REQUEST["page"] )
{
case "search":
     handle_search();
     break;
default:
     break;
}

function handle_search()
{
     //  Form submission or form request
     if( isset( $_REQUEST["submit"] ) )
     {
          //  Handle form
          //  Show results
     }
    else
    {
         $content = $search_form;
    }
    
    echo $content;
}

 

 

Again, if you hit enter in the form field, the $_REQUEST["submit'] isn't there! When you click the form submit button, it works! Very odd.

[rhodesa]

yeah...that button won't be sent if it's not clicked. is the form method GET or POST?

[.josh]

maybe I'm not doing it the right or proper way, but I never do an initial check to see if the submit value is there or not.  I mean, you're gonna be checking fields anyway, right? So just cut to the chase and look for them first.  Or just do a blanket if($_POST) or if($_REQUEST).

[rhodesa]

i was asking cus i usually do a

if($_SERVER['REQUEST_METHOD'] == 'POST'){

 

but if it's a GET form, you will want to do a

if(isset($_GET['search_field'])){

[Rottingham]

The METHOD is POST. I'm just stumped because I have multiple apps that use the same backend technology and so far this is the only one with this problem.

[deansatch]

can you post your html code with the button on it? It is the only button on the page isn't it?

[GingerRobot]

Yes, that's correct. If you press enter to submit a form in IE, the submit button will not be set. It will in firefox.

 

You should do something like this to check if a form has been submitted:

 

if(count($_POST) > 0){
//form is submitted
}

 

Edit: Or, as CV suggested, you can do:

 

if($_POST){
}

 

 

[Rottingham]

It is the only button yes!

 

 

<table width="550" border="0" cellspacing="2" cellpadding="0">

<form name="inventory_search" action="inventory.php" method="post" >

<input type="hidden" name="page" value="search" />

<tr>

<td class="stat_title" width="85">Look For: </td>

<td class="stat_title" width="170"><input style="width:163px;" type="text" name="LOOK_FOR" id="LOOK_FOR" value="" class="form_inputText" /></td>

<td colspan="2"></td>

</tr>

<tr>

<td class="stat_title" width="85" valign="top">Look In: </td>

<td class="stat_title" colspan="3">

<input type="radio" name="LOOK_IN" value="All" checked /> All<br />

<input type="radio" name="LOOK_IN" value="Part_Num" /> Part Number<br />

<input type="radio" name="LOOK_IN" value="Sales_Description" /> Description</td>

  </tr>

  <tr>

  <td><input type="submit" name="submit" value="Search" class="button_small" /></td></tr>

  </tr>

</form>

</table>