[WEB4LIB] Re: Modified "get" action for forms?

[Thomas Dowling]

I think you'll find you're mistaken.  There are Good Redirects and Evil
Redirects, and this one--a "Location: " header in the standard CGI
environment--is a good one.  Redirects only screw up back buttons if you
use the '<meta http-equiv="refresh" content="0;...' hack.

Thomas Dowling
OhioLINK - Ohio Library and Information Network
tdowling at ohiolink.edu


----- Original Message -----
From: "Chris Shaffer" <shaffer at uic.edu>
To: "Multiple recipients of list" <web4lib at webjunction.org>
Sent: Wednesday, November 08, 2000 1:37 PM
Subject: [WEB4LIB] Re: Modified "get" action for forms?


> Unfortunately, this solution uses a redirect, which disables the user's
> back button, which is something I need to avoid.
>
> Chris Shaffer
> shaffer at uic.edu
>
> At 11/8/00 06:32 AM, you wrote:
> >----- Original Message -----
> >From: "Chris Shaffer" <shaffer at uic.edu>
> >To: "Multiple recipients of list" <web4lib at webjunction.org>
> >Sent: Tuesday, November 07, 2000 5:22 PM
> >Subject: [WEB4LIB] Modified "get" action for forms?
> >
> >
> > > I have a database search form with many input fields, only a few of
which
> > > are used in the average search.  I'd like the search logic to be
embedded
> > > in the URL so that search results pages can be bookmarks or
> > > favorites.  However, action="get" puts all the fields in the URL,
which
> > > results in a very long URL.  I'd like to generate a URL that only
includes
> > > non-null input fields.  Is there any way to do this that 1) does not
use
> > > javascript and 2) does not disable the browser back button via
redirect?
> > >
> > > FYI, our web server is Unix, Apache, PHP, MySQL.
> > > -----
> >
> >I dunno from PHP, but your script should be able to:
> >
> >   Examine the QUERY_STRING environment variable to
> >   see if there are null values
> >
> >   If there are null values,
> >     strip them out of the
> >     QUERY_STRING and
> >
> >     send a redirect to itself
> >
> >   If there are no null values, execute the search
> >
> >The user will end up seeing only non-null values in the URL.
> >
> >Thomas Dowling
> >Ohio Library and Information Network
> >tdowling at ohiolink.edu
>
>