What are the best practices for validating form inputs in PHP to prevent errors like the one mentioned in the thread?

Issue: The best practice for validating form inputs in PHP is to use server-side validation to prevent errors and ensure that the data submitted by users is safe and accurate. This can help prevent issues like SQL injection, cross-site scripting, and other security vulnerabilities. 

// Example PHP code for validating form inputs
if ($_SERVER["REQUEST_METHOD"] == "POST") {
    $name = $_POST["name"];
    $email = $_POST["email"];
    
    // Validate name
    if (empty($name)) {
        $errors[] = "Name is required";
    }
    
    // Validate email
    if (empty($email)) {
        $errors[] = "Email is required";
    } elseif (!filter_var($email, FILTER_VALIDATE_EMAIL)) {
        $errors[] = "Invalid email format";
    }
    
    // Display errors or proceed with form submission
    if (!empty($errors)) {
        foreach ($errors as $error) {
            echo $error . "<br>";
        }
    } else {
        // Process form data
    }
}

Keywords

form validation PHP error prevention input validation data sanitization

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