Remove unwanted characters before entering database?

[lovewebdev]

I usually remove udnesirable special characters that could be entered in a form before submitting to a database with this

<cfset variable = #Replace(variable,"%","", "all")#>

is there a better way I could simply list all of the unwanted values and just replace from that list?

[Dan_Bracuk]

The safetext function at cflib.org might help you.

[CFML_MANIAC]

I use something like this (below) to not only replace characters, but entire words from strings.   I use mostly use this code to replace 'bad words' in moderated forums with 'alternative text'.

Assume you have a field called 'newdata' for your user to fill out, and they type the following:

"In 99% of the studies, someone always badwords ^ the flow of the discussion"

.

Run this against the 'newdata' field before inserting it into the database (or before displaying it on the screen if you want to show it before it is inserted)

<cfset fixeddata = '#ReplaceList(newdata, "%,^,badword"," percent,up,goodword")#'>

The result, if you output the resulting #fixeddata# would read:

"In 99 percent of the studies, somoene always goodwords up the flow of the discussion"

All kinds of possibilities with this.

Hope it helped,

WHeis

[Adam Cameron.]

There's replaceList() or reReplace() which could be used here.

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Adam