// function that gathers vars for the curl req
  echo json_encode($login);
  $ch = curl_init($Mid_url); //Init curl
  curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER, $headers);
  curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POST, true);
  // curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_FOLLOWLOCATION, true); // follow redirect to new housing page
  curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS, json_encode($login)); // concat ucid/pass
  curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, true); // return results to stdout instead of echo
  $result = curl_exec($ch); // send the curl, return result (actually html page after redir)
  curl_close($ch);
  return $result;
}

/* get data from index.thml */
// $data = json_decode($HTTP_RAW_POST_DATA);
$ucid_POST = 'myusername';//$data->ucid;
$pass_POST = 'mypassword';//$data->pass;

/* get response from mid */
$result = toMid($ucid_POST, $pass_POST);
echo json_decode($result);

// raw data I get in the terminal when I execute this php

{"response":{"njitucid":"mysusername","njitsuccess":1,"dbucid":"myusername","dbsuccess":"0","debug":""}SUCCESS