Multiple inputs with same name through POST in php

Question 1

Is it possible to get multiple inputs of the same name to post and then access them from PHP? The idea is this: I have a form that allows the entry of an indefinite number of physical addresses along with other information. If I simply gave each of those fields the same name across several entries and submitted that data through post, would PHP be able to access it?

Say, for example, I have five input on one page named "xyz" and I want to access them using PHP. Could I do something like:

    $_POST['xyz'][0]

If so, that would make my life ten times easier, as I could send an indefinite amount of information through a form and get it processed by the server simply by looping through the array of items with the name "xyz".

Question 2

Change the names of your inputs:

<input name="xyz[]" value="Lorem" />
<input name="xyz[]" value="ipsum"  />
<input name="xyz[]" value="dolor" />
<input name="xyz[]" value="sit" />
<input name="xyz[]" value="amet" />

Then:

$_POST['xyz'][0] == 'Lorem'
$_POST['xyz'][4] == 'amet'

If so, that would make my life ten times easier, as I could send an indefinite amount of information through a form and get it processed by the server simply by looping through the array of items with the name "xyz".

Note that this is probably the wrong solution. Obviously, it depends on the data you are sending.

Question 3

Your $_POST array contains the invite array, so reading it out as

<?php
if(isset($_POST['invite'])){
  $invite = $_POST['invite'];
  echo $invite;
}
?>

won't work since it's an array. You have to loop through the array to get all of the values.

<?php
if(isset($_POST['invite'])){
  if (is_array($_POST['invite'])) {
    foreach($_POST['invite'] as $value){
      echo $value;
    }
  } else {
    $value = $_POST['invite'];
    echo $value;
  }
}
?>

Question 4

Try this (assuming your form got same number of elements for each of the child_name, child_age etc):

for ($ix=0; $ix<count($_POST['child_name']); $ix++)
{
    $insert_children_data = array(
        'child_name' => $_POST['child_name'][$ix],
        'child_age' => $_POST['child_age'][$ix],
        'child_gender' => $_POST['child_gender'][$ix],
        'child_school' => $_POST['child_school'][$ix]
    );

    $insert = $this->db->insert('portrait_children', $insert_children_data);
    //return $insert; //you cant return here. must let the loop complete.
}

Question 5

Instead of checking !isset(), use empty(). If the form posts an empty string, it will still show up in the $_POST as an empty string, and isset() would return TRUE.

I've replaced your incremental for loop with a foreach loop, which is almost always used in PHP for iterating an array.

$out_data = array();
foreach ($form_data as $key) {
    if(empty($_POST[$key])) {
        $out_data[$key] = "NO_DATA";
    }
    else {
        $out_data[$key] = $_POST[$key];
    }
}

Question 6

You have to append each value in turn. Currently you are only appending the first one (because that is what val() returns.

$('input[name="answer[]"]').each(function (index, member) {
    var value = $(member).val();
    fdata.append('answers[]', value);
});

Multiple inputs with same name through POST in php

Answers

php,html,arrays,forms,post