web dev problem

Doctor Who has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Hi All, I am having a lot of trouble passing a value thru cgi. A dropdown list is being populated by values obtained from a database - the dropdown displays the values fine in HTML however when one is selected and passed (e.g. submit button is clicked) i am unable to access the value on the subsequent html page thru the normal way (e.g. $FORMNAME{'valuename'}) this method works fine for dropdowns that have pre-assigned values in HTML but not when the values come from a database! What am i doing wrong? awaiting your wisdom to be bestowed, the doctor

Comment on web dev problem

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Re: web dev problem by davorg (Chancellor) on Aug 19, 2002 at 09:39 UTC
I think that you need to show more of the code. Specifically the bits that create the dropdown list and the bits that interpret the CGI parameters. And here's a tip. `$FORMNAME{'valuename'}` is not the "normal way" to access CGI values. If anything, it points to a potentially broken CGI parameter parser. -- <http://www.dave.org.uk> "The first rule of Perl club is you do not talk about Perl club." -- Chip Salzenberg	[reply]
Re: web dev problem by fruiture (Curate) on Aug 19, 2002 at 09:36 UTC
... i am unable to access the value on the subsequent html page thru the normal way (e.g. $FORMNAME{'valuename'})... The "normal way" is a good description. Whenever I see something like $UPPERCASE_HASH{formfield} there's an alert shouting from deep in my head: "use CGI;#!!!". Please, use the CGI module whenever you use the CGI, CGI without CGI.pm is in 99% of all cases determined to cause nasty problems. How does your HTML look in detail and does it follow these guidelines? -- http://fruiture.de	[reply]
Re: web dev problem by Aristotle (Chancellor) on Aug 19, 2002 at 10:06 UTC
Have a look on Ovid's excellent CGI tutorial on proper techniques for writing CGI scripts. Makeshifts last the longest.	[reply]
Re: web dev problem by gloryhack (Deacon) on Aug 19, 2002 at 20:51 UTC
I'll betcha a dollar that the HTML you're generating is non-standard. Check out your HTML-ification code, and view the output as source, rather than rendered, HTML.	[reply]