Question

This may be the way my server is set up, but I’m banging my head against the wall. I’m trying to say that if $action has no value or has a value that is not “add” or “delete” then have an error, else keep running the script. However, I get an error no matter what $action is.

 $action = $_GET['a'];
 if((!isset($action)) || ($action != "add" || $action != "delete")){
     //header("location:index.php");
     echo "error <br>";
 }

$action is being set properly and if run something like if($action =="add") it works. This is on my local host, so it could be a settings issue.

Answer 1

Your logic is slightly off. The second || should be &&:

if ((!isset($action)) || ($action != "add" && $action != "delete"))

You can see why your original line fails by trying out a sample value. Let’s say $action is "delete". Here’s how the condition reduces down step by step:

// $action == "delete"
if ((!isset($action)) || ($action != "add" || $action != "delete"))
if ((!true) || ($action != "add" || $action != "delete"))
if (false || ($action != "add" || $action != "delete"))
if ($action != "add" || $action != "delete")
if (true || $action != "delete")
if (true || false)
if (true)

Oops! The condition just succeeded and printed “error”, but it was supposed to fail. In fact, if you think about it, no matter what the value of $action is, one of the two != tests will return true. Switch the || to && and then the second to last line becomes if (true && false), which properly reduces to if (false).

There is a way to use || and have the test work, by the way. You have to negate everything else using De Morgan’s law, i.e.:

if ((!isset($action)) || !($action == "add" || $action == "delete"))

You can read that in English as “if action is not (either add or remove), then”.