$_GET, $_POST and $_SESSION

[Libertine]

Hi,

 

I do not have a problem with specific code but rather code design/technique. I am not able to articulate the problem very well but here goes.

 

I am building a [mostly] object oriented PHP store as a personal project to improve my PHP skills. However I'm running into some problems concerning my sorting, pagination and filtering facilities. I've tried to use $_GET to store the following:

• Page being viewed by the user
  
• Category (e.g. fruit or vegetables)
  
• Sort method (e.g price ascending, descending etc.)
  

 

When the user clicks on a link to another page for example, I must append the page number to the URL, something like "index.php?page=2" but the other $_GET parameters are lost unless I do something like:

 

<a href=\"index.php?cat=".$_GET['cat']."&sort=".$_GET['sort']."&page=".($this->pageNum+1)."\">Next-> </a>

 

This means whenever there is a link or form submission I must find a way to carry over all those parameters to ensure the page and category are remembered, otherwise the user is returned to page 1 and the main category. It's a mess and has become too confusing with the introduction of other pages.

 

Clearly, I'm doing it all wrong. $_GET parameters alone are not a good solution here, at least how I'm using them. So I ask of you, what's the correct way to store information such as page number, sorting method and category? Must I use $_SESSIONS and if so how? Thanks.

 

[Zane]

If you intend on keeping this information handy then there's no harm in using sessions.. because that's the whole purpose of the superglobal.  To store data within the users browser session.