PHP some $_POST values missing but are present in php://input

I have a very big html form (containing table with rows, which contain multiple inputs), which i need to submit to PHP script via POST request. The problem is some values don’t come through and are absent in PHP’s $_POST superglobal.

I checked (using Firebug extension) that the values are actually sent to server by the browser.

$_POST gets populated, but some values are just missing.

I checked what is raw request using:

$raw_post = file_get_contents('php://input');

and the string returned has the values. They are just not parsed into $_POST array. The strange thing i noticed is, it seems that the php://input values are cut after some length, and rest of the string does not come through to $_POST.

I thought about post_max_size and memory_limit and set them to large values:

memory_limit = 256M
post_max_size = 150M

but according to php documentation $_POST should not contain any values if request made is bigger than post_max_size.

Due to big size of form and request I cannot post it here, but i can post php script i used to debug the problem:

var_dump($file = file_get_contents('php://input'));
var_dump($_POST);
//... then i parsed the $file

Server version: Apache/2.2.9 (Debian)
PHP version: PHP 5.3.2-0.dotdeb.2

Can enyone explain reason of such strange PHP behaviour, and what should i do (change php settings, code?) to use $_POST array while processing form?

EDIT: To be clear: not only the values are missing. $_POST does not contain these keys either.

e.x. fragment of raw post:

t_dodparam%5B198%5D=&t_dodparam2%5B198%5D=&t_kolejnosc%5B198%5D=199&n_indeks=201&n_wartosc=testtesttest

Key ‘t_dodparam’ is in post and it has key 198. The rest of parameters are missing (e.x. t_dodparam2 is in post, but it has no such key as 198, and there is no such key as n_wartosc in $_POST)

Answer

PHP modifies fields containing the characters space, dot, open square bracket and others to be compatible with with the deprecated register_globals

you can find a lot of workarounds in the comments here: PHP: Variables From External Sources

For Exampe (comment by POSTer):

<?php
//Function to fix up PHP's messing up POST input containing dots, etc.
function getRealPOST() {
    $pairs = explode("&", file_get_contents("php://input"));
    $vars = array();
    foreach ($pairs as $pair) {
        $nv = explode("=", $pair);
        $name = urldecode($nv[0]);
        $value = urldecode($nv[1]);
        $vars[$name] = $value;
    }
    return $vars;
}
?>

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Answer