Working with ampersands in $_GET functions

Question

If I have a URL like asdf.com/index.php?a=0&b=2, then using $_GET for a would be 0 and for b would be 2. However, the term I put into a single $_GET function has an ampersand in it already, like a=Steak&Cheese. Is there a way to make ampersands work without the $_GET variable thinking its job ends when the ampersand shows up (therefore not pulling the entire term)?

Answer 1

Yes, you must URL Encode before request URL. Read this http://www.w3schools.com/TAGS/ref_urlencode.asp

Answer 2

Here is a previous post covering this in jquery AJAX requests, but to summarize you have to encoded the uri. This will convert the ampersand value to a ascii value. Ampersand in GET, PHP

Answer 3

urlencode() it so & turns into %26.

If you need to make a query string out of some parameters, you can use http_build_query() instead and it will URL encode your parameters for you.

On the receiving end, your $_GET values will be decoded for you by PHP, so the query string a=Steak%26Cheese corresponds to $_GET = array('a' => 'Steak&Cheese').