PHP talk to a running Java program on a Linux platform..?

Hey everyone, I've run into a bit of a programming quandry, and need some advise on how I should proceed. I have a java server program running on the server which acts as a countdown clock, it counts from N time to 0 (it does some other stuff too, but thats not important). This program acts as a server, in that everytime a socket connection is made to the port its monitoring, it will return the amount of time left to the client, and close the connection. In my case, I want to show the amount of time remaining in my browser, so I have a php script handle opening up a client socket to the server program, and storing all the necessary information, and then returning that to my browser. It works fine, but to me it seems to make little sence to have a php script, which is physically sitting right next to my Java program on the server, to go through the work of establishing a client-socket session. Is there another more efficient and senseable way to have my PHP script talk to a background running Java program?Thanks everyone, Christian Calloway