Re: POST and session vars w/ same name

On Sun, 3 Dec 2000, Jeffrey Blaze wrote: > Are there any known side-effects to having a local variable and a session > variable with the same name? Session variables are no different from any other global variables. When defining a function, you open up a new name space that can have variables of the same name as "outside." Global variables are only available or mutable when you invoke the GLOBAL command. So you can do: <?php function print_a() { $a=3; echo "\$a = ", $a, "\n"; } $a = 4; echo "\$a = ", $a, "\n"; print_a(); echo "\$a = ", $a, "\n"; ?> And you will get: $a = 4 $a = 3 $a = 4 But your question seems to be about POST variables, not local variables. Do a phpinfo and look for a variable called gpc_order (or variables_order). That tells you what order the variables are defined. Mine is "EGPCS", which stands for Environment, GET, POST, Cookie, and Session. A major side-effect to my having a POST variable and a session variable with the same name would be that I would lose the POST variable. Or at least the ability to call it as a simple variable. The two values may still be in the arrays $HTTP_POST_VARS and $HTTP_COOKIE_VARS. Don't know. I try to either take advantage of the variables order or code so that it isn't an issue. If you don't want variables killing other ones, just don't use the same names! HTH, Matt ---------------------------------------------------------------- Matthew Leingang http://www.math.rutgers.edu/ Rutgers University leingang@math.rutgers.edu Department of Mathematics "This signature needs no quote."