In PHP can I capture a variable from a URL and then use that to determine what is displayed?

Question

I am trying to avoid setting up a database for this, I know it would be better. I just want something fast and easy.

I have a page of coupon offers and I want my index.php file to display them all when no url parameters are added but when someone puts ?city=NewYork for instance I want to display only those that are relevant for New Yorkers. It seems to be working, but I am only getting the first city's HTML every time, is something missing?

My code looks like this.

<?php

$city= $_GET['city'];

// The value of the variable name is found

echo "<h1>" . $_GET['city'] . " Offers</h1>";

if ($city = 'NewYork') {

print "New York HTML here";

} elseif ($city = 'Boston') {

print "Boston HTML here";

} elseif ($city = 'Austin') {

print "Austin HTML here";

} elseif ($city = 'WashingtonDC') {

print "WashintonDC HTML Here";

} else {

include 'directory.php';

}

?>

Directory.php is my default landing page.

Chris · Answer

You are using the assignment operator (=), not the comparison operator: == / ===.

if ($city = 'NewYork') 
will always be true, because this sets $city to "NewYork", then does
if ($city), and since $city is not null or empty, it evaluates to true.

You need if ($city == "NewYork") ...

Anonymous · Answer

tricky stuff do a search at yahoo or google that could actually help

Alasdair M · Answer

Remember how equality statement works.  = will set it and == will compare.

Would you not be better off using a switch statement anyway?

switch($city)
case "NewYork":
 //Do stuff
break;
case "Boston":
 //Do stuff
break;

and so on.....

Kookiemon · Answer

Conditional equality statements use two = signs, not one.

if ($city == 'NewYork')

? · Answer

http://www.php.net/manual/en/reserved.variables.get.php
i suggest switching to asp.

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In PHP can I capture a variable from a URL and then use that to determine what is displayed?

5 Answers