PHP_POST form problem

[Lonig]

this thing is stuck in a loop... I'm trying to figure out how I can do this loop to work to my needs. I know this is simple and I'm just doing it wrong.the previous page has a form that POSTs to this page. However, it posts lightName1, lightName2, etc etc. So I am trying to get the information to set variables that I am using farther down the page... which does another loop(one that works). Any ideas would be appreciated. Hopefully I find my mistake before you all have to, I know it's something simple...

$lt = 0;$lightTotal = $_POST["lightTotal"];do  {  $lt++;	$lightName .$lt = $_POST["lightName" . $lt];	$lcolor . $lt = $_POST["lightColor" . $lt . "Light"];	$lightEffect . $lt = $_POST["lightEffect" . $lt];	$lightColor . $lt = $_POST["lightColor" . $lt];	$goodRefer . $lt = $_POST["goodRefer" . $lt];	$badRefer . $lt = $_POST["badRefer" . $lt];  }while ($lt<$lightTotal);?>

[jeffman]

You can't make a variable name with DOT. A dot operation is what we call a right-hand value. Right of the equals sign, that is. What you really want is series of arrays. Like this:$lightName[$lt] = $_POST["lightName" . $lt]; #assuming your form names really look like that.

[Lonig]

Argh, why does w3schools and the php manual have to try and be so confusing on form data with arrays... I think I need to setup something like:

<?phpif ($_POST) {	echo '<pre>';	echo htmlspecialchars(print_r($_POST, true));	echo '</pre>';}?><form action="" method="post">	Name:  <input type="text" name="personal[name]" /><br />	Email: <input type="text" name="personal[email]" /><br />	Beer: <br />	<select multiple name="beer[]">		<option value="warthog">Warthog</option>		<option value="guinness">Guinness</option>		<option value="stuttgarter">Stuttgarter Schwabenbräu</option>	</select><br />	<input type="submit" value="submit me!" /></form>

But I cannot figure out how to READ it once I put it in... I dont understand how to read the array and separate it into variables after.ie: If I setup linkName to an array, how do I pull each one out and name them linkName1, linkName2, etc etc. the amount of linkNames will be however many "linkTotal" there is. Bleh... I have the first two pages done and naturally it doesn't display the dang data on the last page. This is rather frustrating...Sorry, i don't normally get this flustered. I just thought I had a good grasp on what I was doing and it turns out I don't I guess. 2 pages don't mean much if the 3rd doesn't work. And I'd rather not have to set each variable individually, as that will be a horrible mess to work with.

[justsomeguy]

You don't need to pull them out of the array, that's what the array is, it's a data storage structure. You can store it all right there. linkName1 would be $linkName[0], then $linkName[1], $linkName[2], etc. Arrays start at 0, not 1. But you don't need to remove the data from the array, a variable like $linkName[0] is just like any other variable, you can read it, write to it, whatever.