Help with empty() test

[Jawn]

Hello people, can someone please save me before I lose my mind?

 

I am doing the "PHP with MySQL Essential Training" video tutorial by Kevin Skoglund at lynda.com, now I like the tutorials so far and Kevin seems to know what he is talking about. However, there doesn't seem to be a way to get help when you get stuck. During one of the videos he puts in the following code:

 

<?php
if (!isset($_POST[$fieldname]) || (empty($_POST[$fieldname]) && !is_int($_POST[$fieldname]))) {
	$errors[] = $fieldname;
	}
?>

 

Which is supposed to test to see if a posted variable is set, but not empty unless it is an integer - then he runs it in the video and it works for him, but when I run it zero always fails. I have checked the code he is using against mine to make sure I have exactly what he does, about a hundred times now and it seems to be correct. Thinking that I might have errors somewhere else in my file I made a separate script just to test this line of code:

 

<?php

if(isset($_POST['submit'])) {
$errors = array();

if (!isset($_POST['test']) || (!is_int($_POST['test']) && (empty($_POST['test'])  ))) {
	echo "The post <b>failed</b> the if test,<br /> the value passed was: " . $_POST['test'];
} else {
echo "The post <b>passed</b> the if test,<br /> the value was: " . $_POST['test'];
}
}
?>

                     <form action="test.php" method="post">
	             <p>Value for test:<input type="text" name="test" value="" /></p>
	            
	             </p>
	             <input type="submit" name="submit" value="Send Testpost" />
	          </form>	

 

But when I run this one it also always fails on zero, so I have no idea how to proceed. Any direction would be appreciated, thanks for your time.

[Chris92]

I think this is what you were trying to do:

<?php
if( empty($_POST['test']) || !is_int($_POST['test']) )
{
    echo "The post <strong>failed</strong> the if test,<br /> the value passed was: " . $_POST['test'];
} else
{
    echo "The post <strong>passed</strong> the if test,<br /> the value was: " . $_POST['test'];
{
?>

[kenrbnsn]

You have discovered the flaw with using the emty() test to see if a field is truly empty. The "0" (zero) is equivalent to "false".

 

What I do to see if a passed field is truly empty is

<?php
if (strlen(trim(stripslashes($_POST['fld']))) == 0)
   echo 'field is empty;
?>

 

Ken

[Jawn]

Thanks guys, that has helped immensely, I thought I was just being dense but it looks like a mistake in the tutorial.