strange form handler

[system]

ok so im moving a clients site to a new server and now all the admin forms are no longer working. Upon further investigation i have come across a strange way that they are handling forms that ive never seen before. it goes as follows…

in the form handler there is no place where a variable is set to the $_POST value (ie: $catNum = $_POST[‘catNum’];. Somehow it automatically puts the form value in the php variable. The variable name correlates with the name on the input field and if either one is renamed it no longer works. Somehow it automatically generates this variable from the name on the input field and sets the value.

It definietly works on the old server
Both servers are running the same version of PHP.

Has anyone ever seen this before… Am i missing some php module that automatically does this or is this something from an older version of php?

i really dont mind having to rewrite all the form handlers as im getting paid for it but i dont want to waste a bunch of time doing it if theres some simple fix or thing that im missing

[aaronszy]

The “register_globals” option is disabled on the new server. What this option is enabled PHP loop through all your globals ($_POST, $_GET, $_SESSION, $_COOKIES…) and set each element to it’s own variable. Newer versions of PHP leave this off by default since it can create some pretty serious security risks. It also tends to make code REALLY painful to try to follow. If at all possible, try to just fix the scripts so you don’t need to have register globals on.

At the top of your script you will need to do something like the following for each POST variable used:
[php]
$example1 = $_POST[‘example1’];
$example2 = $_POST[‘example2’];
$example3 = $_POST[‘example3’];
[/php]

If you have to you can find your php.ini file on your server and turn on register_globals:
register_globals=true

But, please, don’t do that. Just fix the scripts. register_globals is basically the spawn of Satan.