Question

I’m just learning PHP and am trying the most basic thing: capturing info from a form and sticking it into a table in a mySQL database. I’m embarrassed to ask such a stupid newbie question, but after reviewing two books, several Stack Overflow posts, and 7 different tutorials, I still can’t get my pathetic code to write a few lousy metrics to my database.

Here’s the latest version of the code. Could someone please tell me what I am doing wrong?

* Basic HTML Form *

<form method="post" action="post_metrics_stack.php" >
<p>Date<br />
<input name="date" type="text" /></p>

<p>Metric1<br />
<input name="metric1" type="text" /></p>

<p>Metric2<br />
<input name="metric2" type="text" /></p>

<input type="submit" name="submit" value="Submit" />
</form>

* Processor File *

<?php 

$date=$_POST['date'];
$metric1=$_POST['metric1'];
$metric2=$_POST['metric2'];

$con = mysql_connect("localhost", "root", "mypassword");
if (!$con)
  {die('Could not connect to mysql: ' . mysql_error());} 

$mydb = mysql_select_db("mydatabasename");
if (!$mydb)
  {die('Could not connect to database: ' . mysql_error());} 

mysql_query("INSERT INTO my_metrics VALUES ('$date', '$metric1', '$metric2')"); 
 Print "Your metrics have been successfully added to the database."; 

mysql_close($con);
?> 

Answer 1

Hooray! Hooray! Hooray!

Thank you all for such helpful advice! It finally works! Here’s the updated code in case any other newbies have the same issue. (Hope I didn’t screw anything else up.)

Form

<form method="post" action="post_metrics_stack.php" >
  <p>Date<br />
  <input name="date" type="text" /></p>

  <p>Metric1<br />
  <input name="metric1" type="text" /></p>

  <p>Metric2<br />
  <input name="metric2" type="text" /></p>

<input type="submit" name="submit" value="Submit" />
</form>

Processor

<?php 

  ini_set('display_errors', 1); error_reporting(E_ALL); 

  // 1. Create connection to database

  mysql_connect('localhost','root','mypassword') or die('Could not connect to mysql: <hr>'.mysql_error());

  // 2. Select database

  mysql_select_db("my_metrics") or die('Could not connect to database:<hr>'.mysql_error());


  // 3. Assign variables (after connection as required by escape string)

    $date=mysql_real_escape_string($_POST['date']);
    $metric1=mysql_real_escape_string($_POST['metric1']);
    $metric2=mysql_real_escape_string($_POST['metric2']);


  // 4. Insert data into table

  mysql_query("INSERT INTO my_metrics (date, metric1, metric2) VALUES ('$date', '$metric1', '$metric2')"); 

  Echo 'Your information has been successfully added to the database.';  

  print_r($_POST);

  mysql_close()

?>