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PHP

Posted by Adam Ridgley
Adam Ridgley
12,255 Points

Quick question about htmlspecialchars

Hi all,

I'm trying to use htmlspecialchars to escape output, I haven't used this since the shirts4mike project, but on shirts4mike the script for the contact form was something like this: 

if ($_POST) {

$name = trim($_POST['name']);

}

//<input type="text" name="name" value="<?php if (isset($name)) { echo htmlspecialchars($name); ?>">

However, when I tried testing htmlspecialchars on my own project, it didn't work. The form values I'm using aren't converted to htmlspecialchars unless I do something like this:

if ($_POST) {
$product_name = htmlspecialchars($_POST['productname']);
}


//<form method="post">
//<input type="text" name="productname" value="<?php if //(isset($product_name)) { echo htmlspecialchars($product_name);} ?>">
//<button type="submit">Go</button>
//</form>

I have to specify htmlspecialchars on the $_POST variable and also again when I output the variable in the form field, why doesn't it work when just escaping it once?

Thanks

1 Answer

miguelcastro2
PLUS
miguelcastro2
Courses Plus Student 6,573 Points
miguelcastro2
miguelcastro2
Courses Plus Student 6,573 Points

What leads you to believe that the htmlspecialchars() is not working? Is there an entity in the product name that is not being translated?

Adam Ridgley
Adam Ridgley
12,255 Points

If I type in a script tag for example, after the variable echoes out, it doesn't change it into special chars, and if I inspect the element in the chrome dev tools, it is still the same