Javascript/AJAX/PHP error: No element found and unable to write to a file

Question

I've been struggling with this error for a couple of days now. Searched stackoverflow and other web sources but so far no luck.

The code is fairly simple. I have a test.html file which calls a saveFile.php. However, I have two problems. 1) In Firefox, I keep getting a "no element found" error. Don't see this problem in Chrome. 2) Even though saveFile.php seems to be getting called, it does not write a file as it should. This is the case with both browsers and I really need to be able to write to a file.

This is the test.html file:

<!DOCTYPE html>

<head>
    <meta charset="utf-8">
    <meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge,chrome=1">
    <title>IIDS: Basic Boilerplate</title>
    <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">
</head>

<body>

hello world

<script src="../components/jquery/jquery.js"></script>

<script type="text/javascript">

    $.ajax({
            type: "POST",
            url: "saveFile.php",
            //url: "http://localhost/~usesr1/mywork/saveFile.php",
            //dataType: "json",
            data: 'test',
            success:function(text) {
                    console.log(text);

            },
            error: function(xhr, status) {
                    alert("unable to save data");
            },

    });

</script>

</body>
</html>

This is the saveFile.php:

<?php

    $tdata = "hello world this is a test";
    $testf = fopen('hello123', 'w+');
    fwrite($testf, $tdata);
    fclose($testf);

    echo "yes";
    // header("Content-Type: text/plain"); Got this from another stackoverflow question, but this didn't fix the problem.
    exit();

?>

Both files are in the same directory under ~/public_html. I gave 777 permissions to the directory. This is a machine running Ubuntu 14.04.

In saveFile.php, tried "GET" instead of "POST" but no luck again.

I'm stuck and any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

EDIT: This question is not a duplicate of the one linked in the comments. The main difference is that I am not able to get my php to write to a file. I don't necessarily care about the "no element found" error as long as the php script is able to write to file. I only decided to include that error in this post because I thought it might be relevant to my real problem.

Have you watched the request / response in the browser's console? — Jay Blanchard
– Jay Blanchard, Commented May 14, 2015 at 18:57
what happens if you simply access the saveFile.php route in your browser? does the file get created? — Kris Zani
– Kris Zani, Commented May 14, 2015 at 18:59
Add error reporting to the top of your PHP file(s) right after your opening <?php tag error_reporting(E_ALL); ini_set('display_errors', 1); — Jay Blanchard
– Jay Blanchard, Commented May 14, 2015 at 19:02
Did you search for "firefox no element found"? I found this answer stackoverflow.com/a/976200/4137738 which says: use header('Content-Type: text/plain'); and Firefox will not try to parse the response as XML, and there should be no error. — wmk
– wmk, Commented May 14, 2015 at 19:02

Fabrizio Mazzoni · Accepted Answer · 2015-05-14 20:43:41Z

1

You have to specify when the AJAX event has to happen.

Since you want it to fire when you open the page add the $(document).ready function and it will fire when document has finished loading. Or you can bind it for example to a .click() event of a button.

<script type="text/javascript">
    $(document).ready(function() {
        $.ajax({
                type: "POST",
                url: "saveFile.php",
                data: 'test',
                success:function(text) {
                        console.log(text);   
                },
                error: function(xhr, status) {
                    alert("unable to save data");
                },
        });
    });
</script>

answered May 14, 2015 at 20:43

Fabrizio Mazzoni

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