[SOLVED] Preventing [spaces] on a subject or message.

[Gath]

Hi.

 

I'm kind of lost. Trying to prevent that a subject from a message board to be created with only spaces, but cant manage to make it work.

 

if (!empty($_POST['topic_title']))
{
$topic_title = ereg_replace ( "^[ \t]+|[ \t]+$", '', $topic_title );
if (strlen ($topic_title) < 3)
	{
	$topic_title = '';
	}
	else mysql_query (INSERT ... ... ... );	
};

 

The only thing that might be working wrong is the ereg_replace, except, i copy/pasted it from another script i use and it works fine there.

 

Any ideas?

[GingerRobot]

Try stripping out any unneeded white space with trim before you check the length:

 

<?php
$str = '   ';
$str = trim($str);
if(strlen($str) < 3){
    //invalid title
}else{
    //title is fine
}
?>

 

Of course, you'll also be wanting to use something like mysql_real_escape_string to prevent any sql injection.

 

[MadTechie]

replace the ereg_replace with

 

$topic_title = ereg_replace('^[[:space:]]+|[[:space:]]+$', '', $topic_title);

to remove the spaces the one you currently have is for tab or space, the one above is for whitespace (both)

 

but GingerRobot is correct trim will work

[GingerRobot]

Using regular expressions just to remove the whitespace on the end is a bit overkill anyway. Using the trim function would be more efficient.

[MadTechie]

i 100% agree, the reason for the "replacement regex" was just incase, RegEx is designed for complex replacements + other, trim is designed to .. well trim the string lol