submitting a variable to a subroutine

[idorjee]

hi all,
i've been trying, almost for the whole day, to submit the value of a variable in my perl script (eg, $sequence) to a subroutine in the same script when i click on a submit button. how can i do that? is there any other way execute a second perl script with a click of a button on the first one, submitting the same values of variables in first one????
your help would be greatly appreciated.

[numberwhun]

hi all,
i've been trying, almost for the whole day, to submit the value of a variable in my perl script (eg, $sequence) to a subroutine in the same script when i click on a submit button. how can i do that? is there any other way execute a second perl script with a click of a button on the first one, submitting the same values of variables in first one????
your help would be greatly appreciated.

If we are to help you, we will definitely need to see the code that you have been working with. Please be sure and surround the code with the proper [code] [/code] tags when posting it.

Regards,

Jeff

[idorjee]

Thanks for reminding me of the CODE tags, Jeff. I always forget about that. Sorry, if I've caused you trouble with that in the past.
OK, so here is what I want my code to do. The following code which is a part of my perl script displays the info as an html table, and that part is fine.

print '<TABLE border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="3" width="80%">' . "\n";
print "<tr><th width='15%'>Entry one</th><td>" . $one . "</td></tr>\n"; 
print "<tr><th>Entry two</th><td>" . $two . "</td></tr>\n";
print "<tr><th>Entry three</th><td>" . $three . "</td></tr>\n";
print "</TABLE>\n";
print "<br>";
 
print '<form name="myForm" method="post">'."\n";
print '<input type="hidden" name="insert1" value="$one">'."\n";
print '<input type="hidden" name="insert2" value="$two">'."\n";
print '<input type="hidden" name="insert3" value="$three">'."\n";
print '<input type="submit" name="submit_myForm" value="Submit">'."\n";
print '</form>'."\n"; 
 

But, now when I click on the Submit button, I want the following part of the script to be executed.

my $dbh = DBI->connect ("DBI:mysql:database:123.456.789.1","user","pass") or die "Error: $DBI::errstr\n";
my $sql = "INSERT INTO protein (first, second, third) VALUES ('$one', '$two', '$three')";
my $in = $dbh->prepare($sql);
$in->execute; 
 

How can I do that? I know it sounds easy, and may be it is, but I am so dump that I can't figure it out. Please, help.

Thanks a lot.

[eWish]

Assuming that you are using the CGI module. You can do it like so.

my $q = CGI->new;
my $from_data_name = $q->param('field_name_here');

Then use it later in your script use that variable where you want. But there are some security issues here, When ever you allow the user to submit data you always need to check the data to make sure that it is what you are escpecting.

sub process_form (
 
my $not_valid = 0;
 
#Check the incoming data to make sure it is safe to use.  If not display the form again.    
    unless ($q->param('field_name_here')  =~ /^(?:([\w\s+\d\']+))$/) {
                $not_valid = 1;
    }
    #Check to see if the form needs to be displayed again.    
    if ($not_valid) { &display_form(); } 
    else { &next_sub(); }
 
}
 
sub next_sub (
 
my ($value1, $value2, $value3) = @_;
 
my $insert = $dbh->prepare('INSERT INTO protein (first, second, third) VALUES (?,?,?);
my $insert->execute($value1,$value2,$value3);
 
#rest of code here......
 
)

Use placeholders for your data when inserting and selecting from the database. It is safer and will cause you less headaches later.

[Kelicula]

Assuming that you are using the CGI module. You can do it like so.

my $q = CGI->new;
my $from_data_name = $q->param('field_name_here');

Then use it later in your script use that variable where you want. But there are some security issues here, When ever you allow the user to submit data you always need to check the data to make sure that it is what you are escpecting.

sub process_form (
 
my $not_valid = 0;
 
#Check the incoming data to make sure it is safe to use.  If not display the form again.    
    unless ($q->param('field_name_here')  =~ /^(?:([\w\s+\d\']+))$/) {
                $not_valid = 1;
    }
    #Check to see if the form needs to be displayed again.    
    if ($not_valid) { &display_form(); } 
    else { &next_sub(); }
 
}
 
sub next_sub (
 
my ($value1, $value2, $value3) = @_;
 
my $insert = $dbh->prepare('INSERT INTO protein (first, second, third) VALUES (?,?,?);
my $insert->execute($value1,$value2,$value3);
 
#rest of code here......
 
)

Use placeholders for your data when inserting and selecting from the database. It is safer and will cause you less headaches later.

You can run anything you want after form submission by including a if(param()) clause.
When the page first loads, the param is "undefined" and will return false.
Once the form is submitted it will return true, and the code will be executed.

Also a very good way to check that input submitted by users is safe is by using the "-T" switch. "taint mode". It's not fail safe, but it's easy, and a lot better than nothing. The main problem is that you don't have as much control over what happens after an erroneous entry is made, for that reason eWish's code is useful. But just in general it's good for stopping bad entries, what happens next is ??....


example:

#!/usr/bin/perl -T
 
use strict;
use CGI qw(:standard);
 
print header;
print start_html();
 
my $one = "hey";
my $two = "you";
my $three = "there";
 
 
print start_form(-enctype=>"application/x-www-form-urlencoded"),
      textfield(-name=>'insert1', value=>$one),
      textfield(-name=>'insert2', value=>$two),
      hidden('insert3',$three), # if you want hidden, they default to name, value.
      submit();
 
 
if(param()){
 
my $on = param('insert1'); # remember to grab values from param
my $tw = param('insert2');
my $th = param('insert3');
 
# It's not necessary to create unique scalars, but I play it safe.
 
#do whatever with $on, $tw and $th...
# they will contain what the user or script inserted into
# the form inputs named accordingly. (see the param calls)
 
}
 

You see, by not specifying, perl inserts the current %ENV{SCRIPT_NAME} into the action value in the form tag. The script will call on itself to process the input.

This does work.
See HERE

PS- It's looks like you are need of a here document also.
Instead of repeating so many lines of
print
print
print
etc...

You can create an area where perl will interpret as a separate field.
Most symbols that need to be escaped are ignored by perl and can be used, like
%, and " , or -, and =.
example:

print <<EOH;
 
you can write regular html code in here, without much consideration for perl constraints. Perl variables however, will be interpolated to their values.
 
EOH
 

It's very useful.
You can also assign it to a variable:

 my $stuff = <<EOF;
 
write stuff here...
 
 
EOF
 

Now all that stuff will be stored in $stuff.

Notice that there is NOT a semi-colon after the last identifier.

<<EOF;

than

EOF

Anyway have fun!!

[eWish]

PS- It's looks like you are need of a here document also.
Instead of repeating so many lines of
print
print
print
etc...

You can also use the qq operator.

print qq~
<table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="3" width="80%">
  <tr> 
    <th width='15%'>Entry one</th>
    <td>$one</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <th>Entry two</th>
    <td>$two</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <th>Entry three</th>
    <td>$three</td>
  </tr>
</table>
<br>
<form name="myForm" method="post">
  <input type="hidden" name="insert12" value="$one">
  <input type="hidden" name="insert22" value="$two">
  <input type="hidden" name="insert32" value="$three">
  <input type="submit" name="submit_myForm2" value="Submit">
</form>
~;

But I like keeping my HMTL seperate from my code. To me it makes it cleaner.

HTML::Template

[idorjee]

Thanks a lot eWish and Kelicula. I'm still a bit unsure as to how I should write it all. My initial input comes from an html form, which submits it to the perl script that I mentioned earlier. Here is how it actually looks like:

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;
use CGI;
use Bio::DB::SwissProt;
my $database = new Bio::DB::SwissProt;
my $cgi = new CGI;
print $cgi->header() .
$cgi->start_html(-title => 'Results', -bgcolor => '#6699CC').
$cgi->h1('Results from the DB') . "\n";
 
my @params = $cgi->param();
foreach my $parameter (@params) {
    my $value=$cgi->param($parameter);
    my @values=split(/\s+/,$value);
    foreach my $acc (@values){
        chomp($acc);
 
# gets info. using the $acc with BioPerl module....
my $one = $seq->seq();
#and so on ...
 
#the variables are then displayed as follows 
print '<TABLE border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="3" width="80%">' . "\n";
print "<tr><th width='15%'>Entry one</th><td>" . $one . "</td></tr>\n";
print "<tr><th>Entry two</th><td>" . $two . "</td></tr>\n";
print "<tr><th>Entry three</th><td>" . $three . "</td></tr>\n";
print "</TABLE>\n";
print "<br>";
print '<form name="myForm" method="post">'."\n";
print '<input type="hidden" name="insert1" value="$one">'."\n";
print '<input type="hidden" name="insert2" value="$two">'."\n";
print '<input type="hidden" name="insert3" value="$three">'."\n";
print '<input type="submit" name="submit_myForm" value="Submit">'."\n";
print '</form>'."\n"; 
 

Now with the the submit I wanted to insert the same displayed variables that is in the table ($one, $two and $three) to the MySQL db.

Cheers!!!

[KevinADC]

regardless of other problems you are having, this will not work:

print '<input type="hidden" name="insert1" value="$one">'."\n";

You have a scalar inside a single-quoted string construct: $one.
$one will not be expanded, it will be treated as the literal string $one.

You have to use a double-quoted string or a quote operator that interpolates scalars and arrays:

print "this is \"$foo\"";
print qq{this is "$foo"};
 

qq escapes the double-quotes for you making it very convenient to use. And if you use paired brackets as the delimiters, like {} or (), the qq operator keeps track of them so you don't have to escape them if you use them in the string:

$foo = 'a test';
print qq{this {is} "$foo"};
 

but if you use a symbol, like '~' or '!' as the delimiter you do have to escape it:

$foo = 'a test';
print qq~this \~is\~ "$foo"~;
 

[idorjee]

hi KevinADC,
you were absolutely correct. i was overlooking the "single-quoted" thing. i think it should work now. let's see.
thanks a lot.
cheers!!!

[idorjee]

it works fine now. thanks to all you guys.
^ ^*