[Zope] can one pass values through the 'action' property?

[Florent Guillaume]

[followups to zope-dev]

Tommy, 

You're right, I did the tests and it is indeed a Zope problem.


What happens is this. If you have:

  <form action="/action?row=3" method="POST">
     <input type="submit" name="submit" value="submit">
  </form>

Then what gets sent by Mozilla to the web server is:

  POST /action?row=3 HTTP/1.1
  Host: ...
  ...
  Content-Length: 13

  submit=submit

And indeed there is enough information here to build a correct REQUEST
with both row=3 and submit=submit.

(However note that with a GET method, Mozilla sends:
  GET /action?submit=submit HTTP/1.1
 So the GET method wouldn't work here anyway.)


The culprit is ZPublisher.cgi.FieldStorage, who only looks at the
QUERY_STRING if it's a GET or a HEAD.

If everybody else does it, maybe Zope should do it...




A word about the spec: HTML-4.01 says:

  * If the method is "get" and the action is an HTTP URI, the user agent
  takes the value of action, appends a `?' to it, then appends the form
  data set, encoded using the "application/x-www-form-urlencoded" content
  type. The user agent then traverses the link to this URI. In this
  scenario, form data are restricted to ASCII codes.

  * If the method is "post" and the action is an HTTP URI, the user agent
  conducts an HTTP "post" transaction using the value of the action
  attribute and a message created according to the content type specified
  by the enctype attribute.

So the "get" part isn't even clear, what happens if the action already
contains a '?'... the spec doesn't say. Note BTW that an URI with two
'?' wouldn't be legal.


Cheers,

Florent Guillaume
Nuxeo


> Florent,
> 
> Ok, if it works in Coldfusion and ASP, then there isn't a problem with
> 1. My browser
> 2. HTTP spec
> 3. Development language
> 
> But if, now, I try to do the exact same thing in Zope, and it doesn't work,
> then how could you NOT say that it isn't a Zope problem? I'm not totally
> assuming that Zope is the problem, (assumptions can be deadly), but if it
> has worked before, and doesn't work now with a new development language,
> then where is the first place one should look?
> 
> I'd be interested in input from developers who may have done this in PHP or
> other languages. If it also works in them....
> 
> The only thing that I can think of is if Zope parses differently from other
> languages. Meaning that if you choose to pass variables through the action
> property, then you MUST use Get rather than Post. In the other languages it
> didn't matter, but with Zope, it could potentially matter. I'll test it and
> write back.