[SOLVED] How to execute a link in PHP ?

[tmyonline]

Guys: suppose I have the following piece of code:

 

If TRUE {

  do this;

} else {

  go to this page;

}

 

In the else clause, is there a function in PHP that I can pass in an URL and make it automatically go to that particular page ?

 

The only PHP function I know for this purpose is the "header" function but it does not always work.  Any alternative or suggestions?  Thanks. 

[dbillings]

Depends where your putting the conditional. If it is loaded during the page load you could use a meta redirect

<meta http-equiv="Refresh" content="5;url=http://www.phpfreaks.com" />

[dbo]

Header is the way to do it... you just have to do it before any other output is sent to the screen. The other alternative is javascript.... but if a user disables javascript then there is nothing you can do to make it go there... thus header is the way to go

[tibberous]

Header doesn't always work, but it works like 99% of the time. I can only think of one browser that will not work with header, and even then you have to turn it off. I'd just use header.

[dbo]

What do you mean it doesn't always work? Can you give an example? The only time I've not seen it work is if you use it wrong and send data before headers.

[avillanu]

Guys I am building a simple form submit. After inserting the data into the DB, I'd like the script to redirect the user to a page.

 

I'm using

header('Location: http://www.google.com/');

 

but obviously it gives me

 

Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent

 

Is there any workaround this? I've been doing some googling and evidently this solution does not work if there is any data sent to the page.

[dbo]

The solution is to do your form processing at the top of the page before you send any data.

[BlueSkyIS]

To elaborate: Data can't be sent to the browser before header("Location").

 

If you need to send the user to a page based on the result of some processing, process the data first, then send the user to the location. Don't try to display any information and THEN send the user, because by definition you've already sent the headers and you can't send them a second time.

 

-BSIS

[tmyonline]

Thanks so much for everyone's response here.  I really enjoy this forum.  You guys are really active with your prompt reply, I'm very impressed and thankful!

 

I'd like to particularly thank "dbo".  Your suggestion is very helpful.  The problem I had is that I used server side include to include an upload page at the top of the page.  After I moved it down below the header function, yes, it worked as expected and the uploading process also worked as well.  Many thanks to everyone and to "dbo" in particular.  Have a good weekend :-)

[avillanu]

Great thanks

[dbo]

Glad to have helped and thanks for the kind words