popen

(PHP 4, PHP 5, PHP 7)

popen — 打开进程文件指针

说明

popen ( string $command , string $mode ) : resource

打开一个指向进程的管道，该进程由派生给定的 command 命令执行而产生。

参数

command

命令。

mode

模式。

返回值

返回一个和 fopen() 所返回的相同的文件指针，只不过它是单向的（只能用于读或写）并且必须用 pclose() 来关闭。此指针可以用于 fgets()，fgetss() 和 fwrite()。 当模式为 'r'，返回的文件指针等于命令的 STDOUT，当模式为 'w'，返回的文件指针等于命令的 STDIN。

如果出错返回 FALSE。

范例

Example #1 popen() 例子

<?php
$handle = popen("/bin/ls", "r");
?>

如果未找到要执行的命令，会返回一个合法的资源。这看上去很怪，但有道理。它允许访问 shell 返回的任何错误信息：

Example #2 popen() 例子

<?php
error_reporting(E_ALL);

/* 加入重定向以得到标准错误输出 stderr。 */
$handle = popen('/path/to/executable 2>&1', 'r');
echo "'$handle'; " . gettype($handle) . "\n";
$read = fread($handle, 2096);
echo $read;
pclose($handle);
?>

注释

Note:

如果需要双向支持，使用 proc_open()。

Note: 安全模式 启用时，可仅可用 safe_mode_exec_dir 执行文件。实际上，现在不允许在到可执行的路径中存在 .. 组件。

Warning

安全模式 启用时，命令字符串会被 escapeshellcmd() 转换。因此，echo y | echo x 会变成 echo y \| echo x。

参见

  • pclose() - 关闭进程文件指针
  • fopen() - 打开文件或者 URL
  • proc_open() - 执行一个命令，并且打开用来输入/输出的文件指针。

User Contributed Notes

erco at seriss dot com 01-Oct-2018 10:21
Another workaround for using popen() with "w" mode so that the stdout of the command reaches the browser:

An easy solution is to have two php scripts; "real.php" with the popen($cmd, "w") command in it, the other being "wrapper.php", a one liner that simply invokes system("php real.php");

Invoking "wrapper.php" from the browser allows the popen($cmd,"w") in "real.php" to work as expected, such that stdout of $cmd reaches the browser. If you try to skip the wrapper and just run "real.php", stdout of $cmd is lost to /dev/null.
jlh 10-Aug-2016 07:20
Don't expect this function to return false when the executable doesn't exist in the first place. A stream will be opened anyway but nothing can be read from it. An error similar to "sh: 1: asdfasdfasdf: not found" will be printed to STDERR.

Solution 1: Look at the return value of pclose(), it will be the exit status of the shell that runs the command. On Linux it will be 127 if the executable wasn't found. Otherwise it's the exit status of the executable itself.

Solution 2: Use proc_open() instead, which allows to also capture STDERR and then parse it for errors.

You probably should do both.
anonymous at anon dot com 25-Mar-2015 10:28
As a side note to the code provided by anonymous at anon dot com:

  $cmd = "php longscript.php";

  function execInBackground($cmd) { 
    if (substr(php_uname(), 0, 7) == "Windows"){
        pclose(popen("start /B ". $cmd, "r"));
    } else {
        exec($cmd . " > /dev/null &");  
    }
  }

I had a problem where Windows would close the call too fast before the entire script was interpreted, but I didn't want my main script to hang until it would be fully loaded.

As a workaround, I called a tiny .php script which would then call the larger script.

myfile.php:
<?php
  $cmd = "php timewrapper.php";

  function execInBackground($cmd) { 
    if (substr(php_uname(), 0, 7) == "Windows"){
        pclose(popen("start /B ". $cmd, "r"));
    } else {
        exec($cmd . " > /dev/null &");  
    }
  }
?>

timewrapper.php:
<?php
  $cmd = "php longscript.php";
  $timer = popen("start /B ". $cmd, "r");
  sleep(30);
  pclose($timer);
?>

This way my main script would continue to run without having to pause, while the tiny script pauses while it loads the larger file.
anonymous at anon dot com 08-Feb-2011 01:39
If, on windows, you need to start a batch file that needs administrator privileges, then you can make a shortcut to the batch file, click properties, check to on "run as administrator" on one of the property pages, and then double-click the shortcut once (to initialize that "run as administrator" business).

using popen("/path/to/shortcut.lnk") will then run your batch file with administrator privileges.

handy for when you want to use cli php to do some long running tasks and that php-cli needs to use sessions..
mrjake2 06-Sep-2010 04:08
If you are running in a chroot'ed environment on Debian "Squeeze", this command won't work; there is a problem with the kernel code that popen() eventually calls.

Note that pecl makes heavy use of this command, so if you are running in this environment you will need to install the pecl extension from source instead.
hacklor [AT] NOSPAM [DOT] com 19-Apr-2010 09:03
There is a simple way to start a process in the background but still find out what the process result is. I combined the information from some users below with some of my own coming up with the following:

<?php
$bat_filename = "C:\\my_bat_file.bat";
$bat_log_filename = "C:\\my_bat_file_bat.log";
$bat_file = fopen($bat_filename, "w");
if($bat_file) {
    fwrite($bat_file, "@echo off"."\n");
    fwrite($bat_file, "echo Starting proces >> ".$bat_log_filename."\n");
    fwrite($bat_file, "php c:\\my_php_process.php >> ".$bat_log_filename."\n");
    fwrite($bat_file, "echo End proces >> ".$bat_log_filename."\n");
    fwrite($bat_file, "EXIT"."\n");
    fclose($bat_file);
}
           
//
// Start the process in the background
//
$exe = "start /b ".$bat_filename;
if( pclose(popen($exe, 'r')) ) {
    return true;
}
return false;
?>

In my case the file names of the .bat and .log files weren't always the same, so I needed a dynamic way to create the .bat file. The output from the php command is saved to the log file with the >> command. All prints and errors are stored there. At a later time you can open the log file and see what happened.
php at keithtyler dot net 20-Jan-2010 06:26
Note that you *have* to do a read on the handle before you can feof(), even if the command outputs nothing! So..

<?php
$f=popen("sleep 2","r");
while (!feof($f)) {}
pclose($f);
print "done";
?>

will never finish.
webmaster at php-idee dot de 23-Jul-2009 06:36
If you try to execute a command under Windows the PHP script normally waits until the process has been terminated. Executing long-term processes pauses a PHP script even if you don't want to wait for the end of the process.

It wasn't easy to find this beautiful example how to start a process under Windows without waiting for its termination:

<?php
$commandString = 'start /b c:\\programToRun.exe -attachment "c:\\temp\file1.txt"';
pclose(popen($commandString, 'r'));
?>
Marbug at gmail dot com 03-Feb-2009 03:43
If you want to download files from a linux server with a filesize bigger than 2GB you can use the following:

<?php
function serveFile( $file , $as ){
    header( 'Expires: Mon, 1 Apr 1974 05:00:00 GMT' );
    header( 'Pragma: no-cache' );
    header( 'Cache-Control: must-revalidate, post-check=0, pre-check=0' );
    header( 'Content-Description: File Download' );
    header( 'Content-Type: application/octet-stream' );
    header( 'Content-Length: '.trim(`stat -c%s "$file"`) );
    header( 'Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="'. $as .'"' );
    header( 'Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary' );
    //@readfile( $file );

    flush();
    $fp = popen("tail -c ".trim(`stat -c%s "$file"`)." ".$file.' 2>&1', "r");
    while(!feof($fp))
    {
        // send the current file part to the browser
        print fread($fp, 1024);
        // flush the content to the browser
        flush();
    }
    fclose($fp);
}
?>
rockytriton 10-Sep-2007 11:25
Note, when using this with a batch file in windows, you must put an "exit" at the end of your batch file or you will get a new cmd.exe stuck in your process list every time you execute the page.
betchern0t 13-Apr-2007 09:42
Care needs to be taken in the case of long running child processes. Say you want to run tail -f /var/log/messages or in my case burn dvds. If you have a busy wait, Apache2 can sit towards 100%cpu and steadily grow memory. In my case I crashed the server after about an hour and 90% of the dvd burned. During that time apache had consumed a gig of swap.

Offending code - don't copy:

<?php
        $ThisCommand = sprintf("%s %s",COMMAND,$ThisFile);
        $fp=popen($ThisCommand,"r");
        while (!feof($fp)) {
                set_time_limit (20);
                $results = fgets($fp, 4096);
                if (strlen($results) == 0) {
                   // stop the browser timing out
                   echo " ";
                   flush();
                } else {
                   $tok = strtok($results, "\n");
                   while ($tok !== false) {
                        echo htmlentities(sprintf("%s\n",$tok))."<br/>";
                        flush();
                        $tok = strtok("\n");
                   }
                }
        }
        pclose($fp);
?>

to go from zero memory and 100% cpu  to negligible memory and negligible cpu add a sleep.

<?php
        while (!feof($fp)) {
                set_time_limit (20);
                $results = fgets($fp, 256);
                if (strlen($results) == 0) {
                   // stop the browser timing out
                   echo " ";
                   flush();
                } else {
                   $tok = strtok($results, "\n");
                   while ($tok !== false) {
                        echo htmlentities(sprintf("%s\n",$tok))."<br/>";
                        flush();
                        $tok = strtok("\n");
                   }
                }
                // avoid a busy wait
                sleep(1);

        }
?>

I think the continued banging of the space to keep the browser awake triggered some issues in apache.
don at digithink dot com 19-Dec-2005 04:28
<?php
// The above import function can be easily extended using
// /usr/local/bin/xls2csv (part of catdoc ) and popen
// to read excell files directly.
// In our particular application the first line was the file heading.
function importxls($file,$head=true,$throwfirst=true,$delim=",",$len=1000) {
   $return = false;
   $handle = popen("/usr/local/bin/xls2csv $file", "r");
// or die if not there.
   if ($throwfirst) {
       $throw = fgetcsv($handle, $len, $delim);
   }
   if ($head) {
       $header = fgetcsv($handle, $len, $delim);
   }
   while (($data = fgetcsv($handle, $len, $delim)) !== FALSE) {
       if ($head AND isset($header)) {
           foreach ($header as $key=>$heading) {
               $row[$heading]=(isset($data[$key])) ? $data[$key] : '';
               print "<li>". $heading ."=>" . $row[$heading]."</li>";
           }
           $return[]=$row;
       } else {
           $return[]=$data;
       }
   }
   fclose($handle);
   return $return;
}
?>
rjl at xs4all dot nl 23-Nov-2005 01:16
Truncated output from ps command?

The solution lies in the way ps displays it's info
specifically the -w option which:
'uses 132 columns to display information,
instead of the default which is your window size.'....
somehow with fgets in php that results in 74 characters
regardless off the init length parameter

a bit of code:

<?php
echo '<table width="99%"><tr><td>cron</td></tr>' . "\n";
$fp=popen("/bin/ps -waux","r");
while (!feof($fp)) {
    $buffer = fgets($fp, 4096);
    $croninf .= '<tr><td>' . $buffer . '</td></tr>' . "\n";
}
pclose($fp);
echo $croninf;
echo '</table><br><br>' . "\n";
?>

Ciao,

Rene =<>=
Cride5 08-Sep-2005 05:39
Here is a nice little script for monitoring your http access log.

<?php

$handle = popen("tail -f /etc/httpd/logs/access.log 2>&1", 'r');
while(!feof($handle)) {
    $buffer = fgets($handle);
    echo "$buffer<br/>\n";
    ob_flush();
    flush();
}
pclose($handle);

?>

----
www.eviltree.co.uk
www.solidsites.co.uk
www.mongbong.com
atampone at NOSPAMFORME dot trdsupra dot com 20-Jun-2005 06:26
If you want to fork a process under windows, this is the function to use.  I created a batch file called runcmd.bat with the following line

start %1 %2 %3 %4

then I have the folowing function

<?php
define('RUNCMDPATH', 'c:\\htdocs\\nonwebspace\\runcmd.bat');

function runCmd($cmd) {
    $externalProcess=popen(RUNCMDPATH.' '.$cmd, 'r');
    pclose($externalProcess);
}   
?>

with this, doing something like

<?php runCmd('php.exe printWorkOrder.php 3498'); ?>
will launch php.exe outside of apache and allow the script calling the runCmd() function to continue without waiting for the command line process to return.  The process will run under the same user account that Apache (or whatever webserver you're running) is running under, so make sure it has permissions to do whatever you need to do.  Also, make sure that the batch file has enough %n s in order to pass all the command line variables that you might need to pass.

Special thanks to kicken from the devshed forums for coming up with the idea.
PGP Dude 06-May-2005 12:30
I should say, my host uses a modified form of safe mode, so I don't know if that might have caused a problem with "popen" as opposed to "proc_open".  With safe mode enabled, all words following the initial command string are treated as a single argument. Thus, echo y | echo x becomes echo "y | echo x".  [Because of this,] LinixDude010's srcipt did not work for me.  Seems wrong to read and write with popen, according to the manual.

The script produced pgp text, but there was something wrong with the text and I could not decode it.

This replacement script, using proc_open, which can read and write, DOES work:

<?php
function pgp_encrypt($keyring_location, $public_key_id, $plain_text) {
  $encrypted_text='';
  $key_id = EscapeShellArg($public_key_id);
  putenv("PGPPATH=$keyring_location");

  // encrypt the message
  $descriptorspec = array(
    0 => array("pipe", "r"),  // stdin
    1 => array("pipe", "w"),  // stdout
    2 => array("pipe", "w")   // stderr ?? instead of a file
  );
  $process = proc_open("pgpe -r $key_id -af", $descriptorspec, $pipes);
  if (is_resource($process)) {
    fwrite($pipes[0], $plain_text);
    fclose($pipes[0]);
    while($s= fgets($pipes[1], 1024)) {
          // read from the pipe
          $encrypted_text .= $s;
    }
    fclose($pipes[1]);
    // optional:
    while($s= fgets($pipes[2], 1024)) {
      $encrypted_text.= "\n<p>Error: $s</p>\n";
    }
    fclose($pipes[2]);
  }
  return $encrypted_text;
}

$message = pgp_encrypt("/home/username/.pgp", "to@domain.com", "dummy text to be encrypted");
print nl2br($message);

?>
Michel Machado 06-Mar-2004 05:53
Yet another workaround for not having bidirectional pipes in php.

<?php
$Cmd =
"bc 2>&1 << END\n" .
"100+221\n" .
"1+3*3\n" .
"quit\n" .
"END\n";

$fp = popen($Cmd, 'r');
$read = fread($fp, 1024);
echo $read;
pclose($fp);
?>
http://vmlinuz.nl/about/contact/ 11-Nov-2002 08:58
From the popen linux programmers manual:

"The  command  argument  is  a pointer to a null-terminated string containing a shell command line.  This  command  is passed  to  /bin/sh  using the -c flag."

Since php uses this popen function, you need to be sure /bin/sh exists. This file may not exist in chroot()ed environments.
ajv-php at erkle dot org 08-Aug-2002 11:02
I noticed that some of the examples above seem to advocate passing unencrypted data to gpg via the pipe shell escape, in the absence of a bi-directional popen (on some OSes).

The approach I've taken is similar to:

<?php
  $prefix = 'example';
  $command = '/usr/local/bin/gpg --encrypt --armor --no-tty --batch --no-secmem-warning --recipient "joe.soap@example.com"';
  $tmpfile = tempnam('/tmp', $prefix);
  $pipe = popen("$command 2>&1 >$tmpfile", 'w');
  if (!$pipe) {
    unlink($tmpfile);
  } else {
    fwrite($pipe, $plaintxt, strlen($plaintxt));
    pclose($pipe);
    $fd = fopen($tmpfile, "rb");
    $output = fread($fd, filesize($tmpfile));
    fclose($fd);
    unlink($tmpfile);
  }
  return $output;
?>

This means that unencrypted information is not passed via a (potentially readable) shell command, and only encrypted information gets stored on disc.
12-Jul-2002 02:33
Here is a workaround for not having bidirectional pipes in php.

If you have bidirectional pipe support, don't bother with this.

The trick here is to send the input on the command line to the target application.  In particular I wanted to use openssl without using temp files or named pipes.  This solution should also be thread/process safe.

This does work on Linux (RedHat 7).

<?php
function filterThroughCmd($input, $commandLine) {
  $pipe = popen("echo \"$input\"|$commandLine" , 'r');
  if (!$pipe) {
    print "pipe failed.";
    return "";
  }
  $output = '';
  while(!feof($pipe)) {
    $output .= fread($pipe, 1024);
  }
  pclose($pipe);
  return $output;
}

# example:
print filterThroughCmd("hello", "cat");
# Piping to cat has the effect of echoing your input.
?>
cyberlot at cyberlot dot net 30-Jun-2002 01:29
The below code works for both way processing ;) Have fun folks

<?php
    system("mkfifo pipeout");
   $pipe = popen("./nwserver -module Chapter1E > pipeout","w");
   $pipeout = fopen("pipeout", "r");
   while ($s = fgets($pipeout,1024)) {
    echo $s;
   }

?>
linuxdude010 at yahoo dot com 24-May-2002 11:49
I had all kinds of trouble encrypting a message with PGP, but I finanlly got it to work.  The trick was to 'chmod o+r pubring.pkr' so that the apache server could read the public keys!!!  Then, this function worked fine:

<?PHP
function pgp_encrypt($keyring_location, $public_key_id, $plain_text) {

        $key_id = EscapeShellArg($public_key_id);
        putenv("PGPPATH=$keyring_location");

        // encrypt the message
        $pipe = popen("pgpe -r $key_id -af", "r");              
        fwrite($pipe, $plain_text);
        $encrypted_text = '';
        while($s = fgets($pipe, 1024)) {
                // read from the pipe
                $encrypted_text .= $s;
        }
        pclose($pipe);

        return $encrypted_text;
}

$message = pgp_encrypt("/home/username/.pgp", "to@domain.com", "dummy text to be encrypted");
print nl2br($message);

?>
nricciardi at mindspring dot com 08-Mar-2002 04:38
ive tried using popen using bidirectional pipes without working for obvious reasons, but i managed to create a simple script that managed to take care of the problem.  This example is for gpg encryption.

<?php
   $message = "this is the text to encrypt with gpg";
   $sendto = 'Dummy Key <another@fake.email>';

   system("mkfifo pipein");
   system("mkfifo pipeout");
   system("gpg --encrypt -a -r '$sendto' > pipeout < pipein &");
   $fo = fopen("pipeout", "r");
   $fi = fopen("pipein", "w");
   fwrite($fi, $message, strlen($message));
   fclose($fi);
   while (!feof($fo)) {
      $buf .= fread($fo, 1024);
   }
   echo $buf;
   unlink("pipein");
   unlink("pipeout");
?>

If anyone has a better way of doing this I would love to see it.