Question

I’m working in PHP to allow users to delete content and I want “delete” to be displayed in text(like a hyperlink) instead of a submit button, however, I don’t want to use an actual hyperlink. Think how in most forums when you delete a comment it’s generally text saying “delete comment” instead of a submit button.

I’d like to avoid using GET in this case because it’s for deleting content. I understand OOP so I don’t need an explanation of how it works.

Is there any way to do this with text saying “delete” (not a button) and then use objects to pass it to a function, instead of using a hyperlink to pass values?

Here’s what I’m currently using to display the link, however, I use get to retrieve the values, which I would really like to avoid.

<td><a href="profile.php?userid='<? echo $request['userid']; ?>'&action=delete"><? echo $request['username']; ?></a></td>

<td><a href="profile.php?userid='.    $requestID['userID'].'">Delete</a></td>

Answer 1

Since GET is to get/retrieve data, you should use POST to POST updates to the server (i.e. deleting a record).

• You can either use a submit button, and style it to look like a link
  in CSS (best)
• Or you could use an actual hyperlink and use JavaScript/jQuery to submit it for you to the server (not ideal).

I suggest you use the first one if you must use links. However, there’s nothing wrong with using <button>s:

• Semantically, hyperlinks are supposed to lead the user to a different page, where a button is supposed to make something happen.
• It makes more sense to use a button rather than a link in this case.

Please consider that.