ajax problem in IE, works in firefox, but error shows up as PHP error

[eluser]Circus-Killer[/eluser]
Hey there.
I am currently working on the registration section of a website. there are two select boxes. one that will allow you to choose a region, another to choose a department. everytime a region is selected/changed, the department list must reload from the database the list of departments in that specific region. i have it running in firefox with no problem, but when i try run it in ie7 i get php errors.

here is the ajax script:

Code:

function ajaxFunction(){
    document.registration.deps.disabled = false;
    var ajaxRequest;  // The variable that makes Ajax possible!
    
    try{
        // Opera 8.0+, Firefox, Safari
        ajaxRequest = new XMLHttpRequest();
    } catch (e){
        // Internet Explorer Browsers
        try{
            ajaxRequest = new ActiveXObject("Msxml2.XMLHTTP");
        } catch (e) {
            try{
                ajaxRequest = new ActiveXObject("Microsoft.XMLHTTP");
            } catch (e){
                // Something went wrong
                alert("Your browser broke!");
                return false;
            }
        }
    }
    
    // Create a function that will receive data sent from the server
    ajaxRequest.onreadystatechange = function(){
        if(ajaxRequest.readyState == 4){
            document.getElementById('dep_options')[removed]=ajaxRequest.responseText;
        }
    }

    ajaxRequest.open("GET", "http://localhost/index.php/ajax/get_deps/" + document.registration.region.options[document.registration.region.selectedIndex].value, true);
    ajaxRequest.send(null);
}

and the codeigniter controller it calls:

Code:

<?php
class Ajax extends Controller{
    function get_deps(){
        $this->load->model('ajax_model');
        $deps = $this->ajax_model->get_deps($this->uri->segment(3));
        $response = '<select name="deps">';
        if ($deps->num_rows() > 0){
            foreach ($deps->result() as $row){
                $response = $response.'<option value="'.$row->id.'">'.$row->name.'</option>';
            }
        }
        else{
            $response = $response.'<option value="">--</option>';
        }
        $response = $response.'</select>';
        echo $response;
    }
}
?&gt;

and the model:

Code:

<?php
class Ajax_model extends Model{
    function __construct(){
        parent::Model();
        $this->load->database();
    }
    
    function get_deps($region_id){
        $query = $this->db->query("SELECT id, name
                                FROM departments
                                WHERE region_id = ".$region_id);
        return $query;
    }
}
?>

[eluser]Circus-Killer[/eluser]
i solved the problem by changing the

Code:

echo $response;

in the controller to

Code:

$data['response'] = $response;
$this->load->view('ajax_view', $data);

and then creating a view called ajax_view with the following single line:

Code:

<?=$response;?>