[SOLVED] line breaks in textarea break my code

[mapleleaf]

I have a textarea that has no editor attached so just a simple textarea.

If a user makes a line break i can't get rid of the \n from my code output from the database.

I have tried nl2br() but it still doesn't work

The content of the textarea goes into mysql and out before being echoed out.

I also tried htmlentities()

 

 

For more info this is being sent into a google maps marker

Firebug says:

unterminated string literal

[break on this error] var marker = createMarker(point,'<...:450px">My sale<br>this and this <br />\n

 

How did that"\n" get inthere when i ran it through nl2br()??

 

Any ideas??

 

 

 

[Ken2k7]

Can you post your code and tell me where it breaks?

[mapleleaf]

var marker = createMarker(point,'<div style="width:400px height:450px"><?php echo $loc; ?><br><?php echo nl2br($description); ?><br><?php echo $street; ?><br><?php echo $city; ?><br><?php echo $state; ?>  <?php echo $zip; ?><br><?php echo $phone; ?><br><b>Start: </b><?php echo $start; ?><br><b>End: </b><?php echo $end; ?><br></div>');

 

It just breaks in this line for the google maps.

If i echo nl2br($description);  further down the page no problem.

[mapleleaf]

just to clarify

echo nl2br($description);

gives:

hello

there

echo $description;

gives:

hello there

 

[Ken2k7]

Try storing the second parameter as a variable and then pass it. I mean if the description has a ' quote in it, it'll break your statement. Example:

 

$description = "how's your day?";

 

That ' before the s would break your string.

[mapleleaf]

It doesn't have any quotes in it and I have tried htmlentities($description,'ENT_QUOTES') and still the problem is there

[Ken2k7]

What if you did:

 

echo str_replace('\\', '\', $description);

?

[mapleleaf]

Good idea but unfortunately nope didn't work.

This is way odd isn't it!!

 

[Ken2k7]

How did you store $description anyways? Can I see more of the code?

 

Say you have:

<textarea name="blah"></textarea>

 

What did you do with $_POST['blah']? Did you just store it into $description? Did you do anything else with it?

[mapleleaf]

Yes it went through codeigniter's xss_clean and into a mysql database. It does no alteration to the text unless there is something like <script> or any other potentially bad input.

What we are working with is the output of the query.

This is what goes in

<?php
$this->form_validation->set_rules('description', ' Description', 'required|xss_clean');
if ($this->form_validation->run() == TRUE) {
$inputs = array(

				'title' => $_POST['title'],
				'description' => $_POST['description'],
				'phone' => $phone,
				'email' => $_POST['email'],
				'street' => $_POST['street'],
				'city' => $_POST['city'],
				'state' => $_POST['state'],
				'zip' => $_POST['zip'],
				//get the right format here
				'start' => $start,
				'end' => $end,
				'date_added' => time()

				);
		$this->db->insert('sales', $inputs);
}
?>

 

if that helps and then just a normal query to get the data out.

 

[Ken2k7]

Can you try doing:

 

<textarea name="description"><?php echo $_POST['description']; ?></textarea>

?

 

Would that print okay?

[mapleleaf]

Works as it should

 

[Ken2k7]

Okay, so how are you defining the variable $description? Can you post that bit?

[mapleleaf]

$description = $row->description;

 

[Ken2k7]

What about $description = stripslashes($row->description);?

[mapleleaf]

no slashes there but i tried it anyway and no luck

[wildteen88]

The \n is a visual representation of a newline. nl2br converts these characters into line break tags ( <br /> ). However nl2br will not remove these characters.

 

The true problem actually lies within your JavaScript. Escape characters such as \n only work within double quotes, not single quotes. You should use the following instead when defining your maker variable

 

var marker = createMarker(point,"<div style=\"width:400px height:450px\"><?php echo $loc; ?><br><?php echo nl2br($description); ?><br><?php echo $street; ?><br><?php echo $city; ?><br><?php echo $state; ?>  <?php echo $zip; ?><br><?php echo $phone; ?><br><b>Start: </b><?php echo $start; ?><br><b>End: </b><?php echo $end; ?><br></div>");

[mapleleaf]

Wildteen88

That didn't work but maybe there is a way i can get rid of the \n and replace them with<br> myself. The problem is that they don't seen to be in the string so can't be manipulated. Odd as they obviously are in the string

I may have to use a text editor like tinymce or fckeditor which I was hoping to avoid

[Ken2k7]

What happens to $_POST['description'] value before it gets inserted into the DB?

[mapleleaf]

i just tested it bypassing all the validation and the same result.

In case it is relevant:

 

<?php
$inputs = array(

				'title' => $_POST['title'],
				'description' => $_POST['description'],
				'phone' => $phone,
				'email' => $_POST['email'],
				'street' => $_POST['street'],
				'city' => $_POST['city'],
				'state' => $_POST['state'],
				'zip' => $_POST['zip'],
				//get the right format here
				'start' => $start,
				'end' => $end,
				'date_added' => time(),
				'paid' => 'n'
				);
		$this->db->insert('sales', $inputs);
?>

codeigniter

everything is cleaned of course normally but it happened even without cleaning

 

[Ken2k7]

Does anything happen at $this->db->insert() method?

[mapleleaf]

Cogeigniter generates the query and I suspect you have found the problem. I am sure it makes sure the query is safe. I will look at the class.

[mrMarcus]

something like this?

function removeLineBreaks($input)
{
$input  	= preg_replace('/(?<!\n)\n(?!\n)/', "<br />", $input);
$output  	= str_replace("\r", "", $input);

return $output;
}

 

usage:

var marker = createMarker(point,"<div style=\"width:400px height:450px\"><?php echo $loc; ?><br><?php echo removeLineBreaks($description); ?><br><?php echo $street; ?><br><?php echo $city; ?><br><?php echo $state; ?>  <?php echo $zip; ?><br><?php echo $phone; ?><br><b>Start: </b><?php echo $start; ?><br><b>End: </b><?php echo $end; ?><br></div>");

[lispwriter]

I've had to write my own newline to br code - this last post should work.  The issue is you have to replace both "\n" and "\r" characters.  str_replace should work for both.  Just replace one of the two with <br> and the other with an empty string.

[mapleleaf]

mrMarcus I owe you.

Thank you sooooo much!!

Hours went into that and also thanks to Ken for endless attempts at solving it.

Lipswriter knew all along