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PHP Form Handling

The document provides an overview of PHP form handling, including the creation of a simple HTML form, the differences between GET and POST methods, and the importance of form validation for security. It outlines how to validate user input, handle required fields, and prevent security vulnerabilities such as Cross-site Scripting (XSS) by using functions like htmlspecialchars(). Additionally, it includes examples of how to implement these concepts in PHP code.

Uploaded by

mirkhales
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
2 views

PHP Form Handling

The document provides an overview of PHP form handling, including the creation of a simple HTML form, the differences between GET and POST methods, and the importance of form validation for security. It outlines how to validate user input, handle required fields, and prevent security vulnerabilities such as Cross-site Scripting (XSS) by using functions like htmlspecialchars(). Additionally, it includes examples of how to implement these concepts in PHP code.

Uploaded by

mirkhales
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 13

KAZI A S M-9765645688

PHP Form Handling

PHP - A Simple HTML Form

The example below displays a simple HTML form with two input fields and a submit button:

Example

<html>

<body>

<form action="welcome.php" method="post">

Name: <input type="text" name="name"><br>

E-mail: <input type="text" name="email"><br>

<input type="submit">

</form>

</body>

</html>

GET vs. POST

Both GET and POST create an array (e.g. array( key1 => value1, key2 => value2, key3 =>
value3, ...)). This array holds key/value pairs, where keys are the names of the form controls and
values are the input data from the user.

Both GET and POST are treated as $_GET and $_POST. These are superglobals, which means
that they are always accessible, regardless of scope - and you can access them from any function,
class or file without having to do anything special.

$_GET is an array of variables passed to the current script via the URL parameters.

$_POST is an array of variables passed to the current script via the HTTP POST method.

When to use GET?

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Information sent from a form with the GET method is visible to everyone (all variable names
and values are displayed in the URL). GET also has limits on the amount of information to send.
The limitation is about 2000 characters. However, because the variables are displayed in the
URL, it is possible to bookmark the page. This can be useful in some cases.

GET may be used for sending non-sensitive data.

Note: GET should NEVER be used for sending passwords or other sensitive information!

When to use POST?

Information sent from a form with the POST method is invisible to others (all names/values are
embedded within the body of the HTTP request) and has no limits on the amount of information
to send.

Moreover POST supports advanced functionality such as support for multi-part binary input
while uploading files to server.

However, because the variables are not displayed in the URL, it is not possible to bookmark the
page.

Developers prefer POST for sending form data.

PHP Form Validation


Think SECURITY when processing PHP forms!

These pages will show how to process PHP forms with security in mind. Proper validation of
form data is important to protect your form from hackers and spammers!

The HTML form we will be working at in these chapters, contains various input fields: required
and optional text fields, radio buttons, and a submit button:

The validation rules for the form above are as follows:

Field Validation Rules

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Name Required. + Must only contain letters and whitespace

E-mail Required. + Must contain a valid email address (with @ and .)

Website Optional. If present, it must contain a valid URL

Comment Optional. Multi-line input field (textarea)

Gender Required. Must select one

Text Fields

The name, email, and website fields are text input elements, and the comment field is a textarea.
The HTML code looks like this:

Name: <input type="text" name="name">


E-mail: <input type="text" name="email">
Website: <input type="text" name="website">
Comment: <textarea name="comment" rows="5" cols="40"></textarea>

Radio Buttons

The gender fields are radio buttons and the HTML code looks like this:

Gender:
<input type="radio" name="gender" value="female">Female
<input type="radio" name="gender" value="male">Male
<input type="radio" name="gender" value="other">Other

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The Form Element

The HTML code of the form looks like this:

<form method="post" action="<?php echo htmlspecialchars($_SERVER["PHP_SELF"]);?>">

When the form is submitted, the form data is sent with method="post".

What is the $_SERVER["PHP_SELF"] variable?

The $_SERVER["PHP_SELF"] is a super global variable that returns the filename of the
currently executing script.

So, the $_SERVER["PHP_SELF"] sends the submitted form data to the page itself, instead of
jumping to a different page. This way, the user will get error messages on the same page as the
form.

What is the htmlspecialchars() function?

The htmlspecialchars() function converts special characters to HTML entities. This means that it
will replace HTML characters like < and > with &lt; and &gt;. This prevents attackers from
exploiting the code by injecting HTML or Javascript code (Cross-site Scripting attacks) in forms.

Big Note on PHP Form Security

The $_SERVER["PHP_SELF"] variable can be used by hackers!

If PHP_SELF is used in your page then a user can enter a slash (/) and then some Cross Site
Scripting (XSS) commands to execute.

Cross-site scripting (XSS) is a type of computer security vulnerability typically found in


Web applications. XSS enables attackers to inject client-side script into Web pages viewed
by other users.

Assume we have the following form in a page named "test_form.php":

<form method="post" action="<?php echo $_SERVER["PHP_SELF"];?>">

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Now, if a user enters the normal URL in the address bar like
"http://www.example.com/test_form.php", the above code will be translated to:

<form method="post" action="test_form.php">

So far, so good.

However, consider that a user enters the following URL in the address bar:

http://www.example.com/test_form.php/%22%3E%3Cscript%3Ealert('hacked')%3C/script%3E

In this case, the above code will be translated to:

<form method="post" action="test_form.php/"><script>alert('hacked')</script>

This code adds a script tag and an alert command. And when the page loads, the JavaScript code
will be executed (the user will see an alert box). This is just a simple and harmless example how
the PHP_SELF variable can be exploited.

Be aware of that any JavaScript code can be added inside the <script> tag! A hacker can
redirect the user to a file on another server, and that file can hold malicious code that can alter
the global variables or submit the form to another address to save the user data, for example.

How To Avoid $_SERVER["PHP_SELF"] Exploits?

$_SERVER["PHP_SELF"] exploits can be avoided by using the htmlspecialchars() function.

The form code should look like this:

<form method="post" action="<?php echo htmlspecialchars($_SERVER["PHP_SELF"]);?>">

The htmlspecialchars() function converts special characters to HTML entities. Now if the user
tries to exploit the PHP_SELF variable, it will result in the following output:

<form method="post" action="test_form.php/&quot;&gt;&lt;script&gt;alert('hacked')&lt;/script


&gt;">

The exploit attempt fails, and no harm is done!

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Validate Form Data With PHP

The first thing we will do is to pass all variables through PHP's htmlspecialchars() function.

When we use the htmlspecialchars() function; then if a user tries to submit the following in a text
field:

<script>location.href('http://www.hacked.com')</script>

- this would not be executed, because it would be saved as HTML escaped code, like this:

&lt;script&gt;location.href('http://www.hacked.com')&lt;/script&gt;

The code is now safe to be displayed on a page or inside an e-mail.

We will also do two more things when the user submits the form:

1. Strip unnecessary characters (extra space, tab, newline) from the user input data (with the
PHP trim() function)
2. Remove backslashes (\) from the user input data (with the PHP stripslashes() function)

The next step is to create a function that will do all the checking for us (which is much more
convenient than writing the same code over and over again).

We will name the function test_input().

Now, we can check each $_POST variable with the test_input() function, and the script looks
like this:

Example
<?php
// define variables and set to empty values
$name = $email = $gender = $comment = $website = "";

if ($_SERVER["REQUEST_METHOD"] == "POST") {
$name = test_input($_POST["name"]);
$email = test_input($_POST["email"]);
$website = test_input($_POST["website"]);
$comment = test_input($_POST["comment"]);
$gender = test_input($_POST["gender"]);
}

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function test_input($data) {
$data = trim($data);
$data = stripslashes($data);
$data = htmlspecialchars($data);
return $data;
}
?>

PHP - Required Fields

From the validation rules table on the previous page, we see that the "Name", "E-mail", and
"Gender" fields are required. These fields cannot be empty and must be filled out in the HTML
form.

Field Validation Rules

Name Required. + Must only contain letters and whitespace

E-mail Required. + Must contain a valid email address (with @ and .)

Website Optional. If present, it must contain a valid URL

Comment Optional. Multi-line input field (textarea)

Gender Required. Must select one

In the previous chapter, all input fields were optional.

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In the following code we have added some new variables: $nameErr, $emailErr, $genderErr, and
$websiteErr. These error variables will hold error messages for the required fields. We have also
added an if else statement for each $_POST variable. This checks if the $_POST variable is
empty (with the PHP empty() function). If it is empty, an error message is stored in the different
error variables, and if it is not empty, it sends the user input data through
the test_input() function:

<?php
// define variables and set to empty values
$nameErr = $emailErr = $genderErr = $websiteErr = "";
$name = $email = $gender = $comment = $website = "";

if ($_SERVER["REQUEST_METHOD"] == "POST") {
if (empty($_POST["name"])) {
$nameErr = "Name is required";
} else {
$name = test_input($_POST["name"]);
}

if (empty($_POST["email"])) {
$emailErr = "Email is required";
} else {
$email = test_input($_POST["email"]);
}

if (empty($_POST["website"])) {
$website = "";
} else {
$website = test_input($_POST["website"]);
}

if (empty($_POST["comment"])) {
$comment = "";
} else {
$comment = test_input($_POST["comment"]);
}

if (empty($_POST["gender"])) {
$genderErr = "Gender is required";
} else {
$gender = test_input($_POST["gender"]);
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}
}
?>

PHP - Display The Error Messages

Then in the HTML form, we add a little script after each required field, which generates the
correct error message if needed (that is if the user tries to submit the form without filling out the
required fields):

Example
<form method="post" action="<?php echo htmlspecialchars($_SERVER["PHP_SELF"]);?>">

Name: <input type="text" name="name">


<span class="error">* <?php echo $nameErr;?></span>
<br><br>
E-mail:
<input type="text" name="email">
<span class="error">* <?php echo $emailErr;?></span>
<br><br>
Website:
<input type="text" name="website">
<span class="error"><?php echo $websiteErr;?></span>
<br><br>
Comment: <textarea name="comment" rows="5" cols="40"></textarea>
<br><br>
Gender:
<input type="radio" name="gender" value="female">Female
<input type="radio" name="gender" value="male">Male
<input type="radio" name="gender" value="other">Other
<span class="error">* <?php echo $genderErr;?></span>
<br><br>
<input type="submit" name="submit" value="Submit">

</form>

PHP - Validate Name

The code below shows a simple way to check if the name field only contains letters and
whitespace. If the value of the name field is not valid, then store an error message:

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$name = test_input($_POST["name"]);
if (!preg_match("/^[a-zA-Z ]*$/",$name)) {
$nameErr = "Only letters and white space allowed";
}

The preg_match() function searches a string for pattern, returning true if the pattern
exists, and false otherwise.

PHP - Validate E-mail

The easiest and safest way to check whether an email address is well-formed is to use PHP's
filter_var() function.

In the code below, if the e-mail address is not well-formed, then store an error message:

$email = test_input($_POST["email"]);
if (!filter_var($email, FILTER_VALIDATE_EMAIL)) {
$emailErr = "Invalid email format";
}

PHP - Validate URL

The code below shows a way to check if a URL address syntax is valid (this regular expression
also allows dashes in the URL). If the URL address syntax is not valid, then store an error
message:

$website = test_input($_POST["website"]);
if (!preg_match("/\b(?:(?:https?|ftp):\/\/|www\.)[-a-z0-9+&@#\/%?=~_|!:,.;]*[-a-z0-
9+&@#\/%=~_|]/i",$website)) {
$websiteErr = "Invalid URL";
}

PHP - Validate Name, E-mail, and URL

Now, the script looks like this:

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Example
<?php
// define variables and set to empty values
$nameErr = $emailErr = $genderErr = $websiteErr = "";
$name = $email = $gender = $comment = $website = "";

if ($_SERVER["REQUEST_METHOD"] == "POST") {
if (empty($_POST["name"])) {
$nameErr = "Name is required";
} else {
$name = test_input($_POST["name"]);
// check if name only contains letters and whitespace
if (!preg_match("/^[a-zA-Z ]*$/",$name)) {
$nameErr = "Only letters and white space allowed";
}
}

if (empty($_POST["email"])) {
$emailErr = "Email is required";
} else {
$email = test_input($_POST["email"]);
// check if e-mail address is well-formed
if (!filter_var($email, FILTER_VALIDATE_EMAIL)) {
$emailErr = "Invalid email format";
}
}

if (empty($_POST["website"])) {
$website = "";
} else {
$website = test_input($_POST["website"]);
// check if URL address syntax is valid (this regular expression also allows dashes in the URL)
if (!preg_match("/\b(?:(?:https?|ftp):\/\/|www\.)[-a-z0-9+&@#\/%?=~_|!:,.;]*[-a-z0-
9+&@#\/%=~_|]/i",$website)) {
$websiteErr = "Invalid URL";
}
}

if (empty($_POST["comment"])) {
$comment = "";

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} else {
$comment = test_input($_POST["comment"]);
}

if (empty($_POST["gender"])) {
$genderErr = "Gender is required";
} else {
$gender = test_input($_POST["gender"]);
}
}
?>

PHP - Keep The Values in The Form

To show the values in the input fields after the user hits the submit button, we add a little PHP
script inside the value attribute of the following input fields: name, email, and website. In the
comment textarea field, we put the script between the <textarea> and </textarea> tags. The little
script outputs the value of the $name, $email, $website, and $comment variables.

Then, we also need to show which radio button that was checked. For this, we must manipulate
the checked attribute (not the value attribute for radio buttons):

Name: <input type="text" name="name" value="<?php echo $name;?>">

E-mail: <input type="text" name="email" value="<?php echo $email;?>">

Website: <input type="text" name="website" value="<?php echo $website;?>">

Comment: <textarea name="comment" rows="5" cols="40"><?php echo $comment;?></textare


a>

Gender:
<input type="radio" name="gender"
<?php if (isset($gender) && $gender=="female") echo "checked";?>
value="female">Female
<input type="radio" name="gender"
<?php if (isset($gender) && $gender=="male") echo "checked";?>
value="male">Male
<input type="radio" name="gender"
<?php if (isset($gender) && $gender=="other") echo "checked";?>
value="other">Other

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