Re: Why does PHP have such a pain in the a$$ configurationfile?

Robert Cummings wrote: > On Tue, 2009-05-26 at 18:30 +0100, hessiess@hessiess.com wrote: >> Something that seriously annoys me about PHP is the fact that it has >> a configuration file which can *completely* change the behaviour of >> the language. Take the following for example: >> ---------------------------------------------- >> function parse_to_variable($tplname, $array = array()) >> { >> $fh = fopen($tplname, 'r'); >> $str = fread($fh, filesize($tplname)); >> fclose($fh); >> >> extract($array); >> >> ob_start(); >> eval($str); >> $result = ob_get_contents(); >> ob_end_clean(); >> return $result; >> } >> ---------------------------------------------- >> >> Which would take a template file like this (DTD etc left out): >> ---------------------------------------------- >> <p>List:</p> >> <ul> >> <?php foreach($array as $item): ?> >> >> <li><php echo($item); ?></li> >> <?php endforeach; ?> >> >> </ul> >> ---------------------------------------------- >> >> The above code loads in the template file, eval()'s it and then saves the >> result into a variable, so that it may be intergraed into anouther element >> of a dynamic website, which is a hell of a lot cleaner than the: >> ---------------------------------------------- >> echo ("<something>" . $some_variable . "<something_else>" >> ...); >> ---------------------------------------------- >> >> mess that you find in a lot of PHP code. Not only is it hard to read, but it >> also produces awfully indented HTML, unlike the template method which outputs >> properly indented code and is much easier to read. >> >> This works perfectly so long as output buffering is enabled, however for some >> reason my web host has decided to disable output buffering in the config >> file, >> rendering the above elegant solution completely useless(*). So, why does PHP >> have to have such a pain in the a$$ configuration file. It makes developing >> platform and even install independent code a nightmare, I am seriously >> considering >> moving to a different language because of this. > > Could you tell us what configuration setting they have changed? I wasn't > aware you could prevent the use of output buffering. I guess maybe if > they set output_buffering = 1 to force flushing after a single byte. > Either way, this is not a PHP issue, this is a web host problem. The > blame lies squarely on their shoulders if they have changed how > something fairly standard works. Such settings are usually made > available to people who know what they're doing and who need specific > functionality. > > Cheers, > Rob. In addition to what Rob said, the only other option would be implicit_flush, which is ridiculous if it is set to on. Maybe the file that you're evaling has some ob stuff or flush() in it? -- Thanks! -Shawn http://www.spidean.com