Question

http://pastebin.com/RE31BRSQ

When I do an

if ( empty($_POST['name']) ) {
    $name = 'anon'; 
} else {
    $name = $_POST['name']; 
}

the name is always anon, even if someone enters characters in the field.

Also,

if ( empty($_POST['title']) ) {

} else {
    $title = sha1( $_POST['title'] );
}

How can I make it so there is a ! inserted infront of ['title']?

Answer 1

1.) Are you really sure that your input field is named name?
I would also suggest to use isset():

if ( isset($_POST['name']) && !empty($_POST['name']) )
{
  $name = $_POST['name'];
}
else
{
  $name = 'anon';
}

2.) Use the concatenation operator (if you want to prepend all titles with a ! before hashing):

$title = sha1( '!'.$_POST['title'] );