Question

I’m not really certain where the problem lies but I am passing a variable through ajax and it is not being caught if I pass a blank when I check it with !$varname

Here is my ajax function:

var subscribe = function(){
  var dataString = $("#subinput").val();
   $.ajax ({
   url: '<?php echo $path ?>',
   type: 'POST',
   data: 'email=' + dataString.value,
   datatype: 'JSON',
   success: function(results){
     if(results.err == '1'){
        $('.onconfirmation').css('color','#f00');
     }else{
        $('.onconfirmation').css('color','#5A5A5A');
     }

     $('.onconfirmation').innerHTML(results.message);
     $('.onconfirmation').fadeIn();
     //alert(results);
   }
 });

and here is my PHP:

<?php
$email = $_POST['email'];

if(!$email){
    $o['err'] = '1';
    $o['message'] = 'Please do not leave this field blank';
}/*elseif(filter_var($email, FILTER_VALIDATE_EMAIL)){
    $o['err'] = '1';
    $o['message'] = 'Please enter a valid email address';
}else{
    $o['err'] = '0';
    $o['message'] = 'Thank you for your subscription';
}*/

ob_start();
var_dump($o);
$out = ob_get_clean();

mail('[REDACTED]','debug',$out);
//$o = json_encode($o);
//return ($o);
?>

As you can see it’s in a debugging state at the moment, but if I pass a blank value through into this, the email I am getting is NULL. If I email myself the $email variable instead of the $out variable, the email I get is undefined, but if I remove the ! from the if statement, the email I get is:

array(2) {
  ["err"]=>
  string(1) "1"
  ["message"]=>
  string(36) "Please do not leave this field blank"
} 

I’m sure I am just missing something awfully simple, I always am, but I honestly can’t figure this one out. Any help would be massively appreciated. Cheers.

Answer 1

var subscribe = function(){
  var dataString = $("#subinput").val();
   $.ajax ({
   url: '<?php echo $path ?>',
   type: 'POST',
   data: { email : dataString },
   datatype: 'JSON',
   success: function(results){
     if(results.err == '1'){
        $('.onconfirmation').css('color','#f00');
     }else{
        $('.onconfirmation').css('color','#5A5A5A');
     }

     $('.onconfirmation').innerHTML(results.message);
     $('.onconfirmation').fadeIn();
     //alert(results);
   }
 });

see the line

data: { email : dataString }

Once you have the val() you shouldn’t use ” .value ” and when POST-ing data this way is the correct way to add keys and values.

At PHP do those things..

<?php
$o = array();

if(!isset($_POST['email']) OR empty($_POST['email'])){
    $o['err'] = '1';
    $o['message'] = 'Please do not leave this field blank';
    echo json_encode($o);
    exit();
}

$email = $_POST['email']; 

.......other code

The exit() stops PHP from reading the next lines at your file so IF emial is not set or empty it wont do any further tasks.