$_GET['url']; is not working

if i try the below code, I am able to get the string 'testinggoogleurl' on the page successfully when I go to http://mydomain.com/testing

Route::get('/testing', function () {
  echo "testing string";
});

However, if I use the below code and go to http://mydomain.com/testing?url=sometext i get an error page http error 500

Route::get('/testing', function () {
   $url = $_GET['url'];
   echo $url;
});

The above code works fine in my local laravel installaton. Does not work on Digital Ocean laravel installation. pls advise

Level 2

Maybe there is something wrong with your htaccess config. You should look into server logs, they might tell you something more.

You could check, what's exactly inside the $_GET via

Route::get('/testing', function () {
    dd($_GET);
});

Also it's generally a good idea to use request helpers like

request()->get('url');
// or just inject the request into the method, and then use $request->get...

Input::get('url');

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