Bug #11516: multipart/form-data doesn't accept a NULL character

From: jeroen@smartnet.dhs.org Operating system: winnt4.0 PHP version: 4.0.5 PHP Bug Type: Variables related Bug description: multipart/form-data doesn't accept a NULL character Hi, first of all, I'm not 100% sure this is a bug, but I think it is. anyway, here goes: I manually connect to a php script, by simulating a browser's call. I want to sent some data by simulating a multipart/form-data POST. The data I sent is binary, but since I want to put this data directly into a database, I don't want to use the Content-Disposition: form-data; name="whatever"; filename="C:\whatever.exe" header. This header would cause php to create a file in the tmp dir, and I don't want this. I simply want the binary data I send in a variable. What I did was to set the following header: Content-Disposition: form-data; name="whatever" (without the filename="C:\whatever.exe" part). After that I sent the binary data. This should create a variable $whatever on the server. Everything works just fine until my binary data contains a NULL [chr(0)]. What happens is that php creates the variable $whatever, but truncates everything after the NULL character (including the NULL character itself). Of course you wouldn't be able to send a NULL from a normal multipart form input box or textarea on the web, but I think php should be able to create a variable which contains my NULL character and everything that follows when I manually connect. It correctly creates a file (including the NULL) when I sent the 'filename="whatever"' header. By the way, if my form contains more parts after the binary part with the NULL character, php creates those variables correctly... but it just truncates everything after a NULL when I don't send something like filename="c:\whatever.exe". here is a copy of the headers I manually sent: ****START**** POST /script.php HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: multipart/form-data; boundary=---------------------------7d12b732260086 Host: www.myserver.com Content-Length: [The correct length] -----------------------------7d12b732260086 Content-Disposition: form-data; name="whatever" 123[NULL]456 -----------------------------7d12b732260086 Content-Disposition: form-data; name="foo" normal text, not binary -----------------------------7d12b732260086-- ****END**** my script on the server now has 2 variables; $whatever and $foo. print $foo; #this prints "normal text, not binary" print $whatever; #this prints "123". it should have printed "123 456" (the space here simulating the unprintable NULL character) I hope this all makes sense (I'm not sure it does :) ). But please email me if this message is not completely clear. I hope you get back to me. thanks in advance Jeroen -- Edit Bug report at: http://bugs.php.net/?id=11516&edit=1