[PHP-DEV] Console Work From: Dave Wilson (davemw <email protected>)
Date: 08/15/01

Hi there, I'm new to the list (only subscribed 2 mins ago!). I have subscribed
a) to say bloody well done on a great language! and b) I am trying to find
information on a few things related to console php (php -q)...

First off, I wrote a small addition to ext/standard/exec.c that adds a fork ()
function. I haven't been testing it much yet (I've started to write a web
server in it to see how well it works), but was wondering, is there a reason
why the official PHP 4 currently lacks fork functionality?

Obviously this wouldn't work very well in a web server module environment, but
compiled as a CGI (for shell script style use), it is very handy.

PHP seems pretty complete as far as console work goes, I have a 'standard' read
($prompt) function I can use that will determine the current TTY, open it, and
get a line from the user. Readline is also extremely useful. My problem is with
beutified output however. The day I untar php-x.xx.tar.gz and see
ext/ncurses/php_ncurses.c flying past my terminal is a day I will be very
preoccupied with code hacking into the early hours!

My last 'feature request' is that of either a select () ability (I see 4.0.6
has a function called select in ext/standard/file.c (and ext/sockets/???.c) but
I have not played with it), or another ability to read from files / fifos /
character devices in a non-blocking way. Particularly, /dev/modem work is to my
knowledge impossible at present.

To round up, an ncurses module would be nice, a select function like that in C
would be sex (!), a fork function (like that in C..). Thanks for your time
taken reading the e-mail, and thanks for a bloody brilliant language (I have
used it for web work too). If PHP had the above functionality, I can't see much
left that stops it from being a rather complete and feature-packed general
shell scripting language! (doh! signal handling would be nice too!)

Cherio,

-dw

PS> Another thing I noticed, I wrote a diary.php script that allows me 'ninja
speed' access to an OpenSSL'd diary in a very secure way. The code behind it is
relatively tight, yet when I run it strace'd, I notice that there are a good 50
or so getuid ()'s before the EDITOR is exec'd. The speed at which the program
runs is fine, but I was just wondering if it might indicate an underlying
problem, or is that just the nature of interpreted languages (not very
optimal)! On request, I'll make diary.php available, I intend sticking it on a
public site soon anyway.

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