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   TODO:
   
     The command line options not in the
     list, but in the -h output below:
   
       -e, -z
    
     It would be best to document these, and
     collect more info about -c and -d!
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<appendix id="commandline">
 <title>Using PHP from the command line</title>
 <para>
  The command line options of the PHP executable are useful
  if you would like to debug or test your PHP setup, but they
  can also be handy, if you would like to use PHP for a
  different purpose than web scripting.
 </para>
 <para>
  Note, that you can always direct the output of the PHP
  executable to an external file with the &gt; character,
  so <literal>php -q test.php > test.html</literal> will
  print out the output of <filename>test.php</filename>
  without HTTP headers to the <filename>test.html</filename>
  file in the same directory.
 </para>
 <para>
  You can only use these command line options if you have
  the PHP executable. If you built the server module
  version, and you have no CGI version available on your
  machine, than you have no chance to use these options.
  For Windows users both the PHP executable and the server
  modules are in the binary package, the executable is
  named <filename>php.exe</filename>.
 </para>
 <para>
  This list of command line options is consistent with PHP 4.0.6.
  You can get the actual list and some one line descriptions
  with the <literal>-h</literal> option. The output of
  <literal>php -h</literal> should be something like this:
  <screen>
<![CDATA[
Usage: php [-q] [-h] [-s [-v] [-i] [-f <file>] |  {<file> [args...]}
  -q             Quiet-mode.  Suppress HTTP Header output.
  -s             Display colour syntax highlighted source.
  -f <file>      Parse <file>.  Implies `-q'
  -v             Version number
  -C             Do not chdir to the script's directory
  -c <path>      Look for php.ini file in this directory
  -d foo[=bar]   Define INI entry foo with value 'bar'
  -e             Generate extended information for debugger/profiler
  -z <file>      Load Zend extension <file>.
  -l             Syntax check only (lint)
  -m             Show compiled in modules
  -i             PHP information
  -h             This help
]]>
  </screen>
 </para>
 <para>
  Here we list some of the most important command line options
  with detailed explanations.
 </para>
 <para>
  <table>
   <title>Command line options</title>
   <tgroup cols="2">
    <thead>
     <row>
      <entry>Option</entry>
      <entry>Description</entry>
     </row>
    </thead>
    <tbody>
     <row>
      <entry>-q</entry>
      <entry>
       Suppress HTTP headers output. Normally PHP prints out
       HTTP headers for the calling program (ie. webserver)
       to hand on to the browser. When writing command line
       applications these headers are useless.
      </entry>
     </row>
     <row>
      <entry>-s</entry>
      <entry>
       Display the color highlighted source of the file
       given with its name. This is the same as if you were
       printing out the source using the
       <function>highlight_file</function> function in
       a PHP script.
      </entry>
     </row>
     <row>
      <entry>-f</entry>
      <entry>
       Parse the file given, and search for syntactical and
       fatal errors. This option implies -q. Use for
       debugging purposes.
      </entry>
     </row>
     <row>
      <entry>-v</entry>
      <entry>
       By calling PHP with this option, you can ask
       it to print out its version number, ie: 4.0.6. 
      </entry>
     </row>
     <row>
      <entry>-C</entry>
      <entry>
       Normally PHP changes the working directory to the
       running scripts direcrory. This makes it possible
       for example, to open files in the same directory,
       with only specifying the name of the file. If you
       would like to disable this directory change, use
       this option.
      </entry>
     </row>
     <row>
      <entry>-c</entry>
      <entry>
       Using this option, you can specify an alternative
       <filename>php.ini</filename> path, so PHP will
       search your configurations file in this path
       instead of the default one.
      </entry>
     </row>
     <row>
      <entry>-d</entry>
      <entry>
       With this option, you can set individual 
       <filename>php.ini</filename> settings in the
       time of running a script.
      </entry>
     </row>
     <row>
      <entry>-l</entry>
      <entry>
       Check the file given for syntax errors. This
       option implies -q. Use for debugging purpouses.
       This option won't find fatal errors (like undefined
       functions). Use -f if you would like to test
       for fatal errors too.
      </entry>
     </row>
     <row>
      <entry>-m</entry>
      <entry>
       Using this option, PHP prints out the built in
       (and loaded) PHP and Zend modules, the PHP
       and Zend version numbers, and a short Zend
       copyright notice.
      </entry>
     </row>
     <row>
      <entry>-i</entry>
      <entry>
       This command line option calls
       <function>phpinfo</function>, and prints
       out the results. If PHP is not working well,
       it is advisable to make a <literal>php -i</literal>
       and see if any error messages are printed out
       before or in place of the information tables.
      </entry>
     </row>
     <row>
      <entry>-h</entry>
      <entry>
       With this option, you can get information about
       the actual list of command line options and some
       one line descriptions about what they do.
      </entry>
     </row>
    </tbody>
   </tgroup>
  </table>
 </para>
 <para>
  The PHP executable can be used to run PHP scripts absolutely
  independent from the web server. If you are on a Unix system,
  you should add a special first line to your PHP script, and
  make it executable, so the system will know, what program
  should run the script. On a Windows platform you can associate
  <literal>php.exe -q</literal> with the double click option of
  the <literal>.php</literal> files, or you can make a batch file
  to run the script through PHP. The first line added to the
  script to work on Unix won't hurt on Windows, so you can write
  cross platform programs this way. A simple example of writing
  a command line PHP program can be found below.
 </para>
 <example>
  <title>Script intended to be run from command line (script.php)</title>
  <programlisting role="php">
<![CDATA[
#!/usr/bin/php -q
<?php

if ($argc != 2 || in_array($argv[1], array('--help', '-help', '-h', '-?'))) {
?>

This is a command line PHP script with one option.

  Usage:
  <?php echo $argv[0]; ?> <option>

  <option> can be some word you would like
  to print out. With the --help, -help, -h,
  or -? options, you can get this help.

<?php
} else {
    echo $argv[1];
}
?>
]]>
  </programlisting>
 </example>
 <para>
  In the script above, we used the special first line to indicate,
  that this file should be run by PHP and should not print out HTTP
  headers. There are two variables you can use while writing command
  line applications with PHP: <varname>$argc</varname> and
  <varname>$argv</varname>. The first is the number of arguments plus
  one (the name of the script running). The second is an array
  containing the arguments, starting with the script name as number
  zero (<varname>$argv[0]</varname>).
 </para>
 <para>
  In the program above we checked if there are less or more than one
  arguments. Also if the argument was <literal>--help</literal>,
  <literal>-help</literal>, <literal>-h</literal> or <literal>-?</literal>,
  we printed out the help message, printing the script name dynamically.
  If we received some other argument we echoed that out.
 </para>
 <para>
  If you would like to run the above script on Unix, you need to
  make it executable, and simply call it as
  <literal>script.php echothis</literal> or
  <literal>script.php -h</literal>. On Windows, you can make a
  batch file for this task:
 </para>
 <example>
  <title>Batch file to run a command line PHP script (script.bat)</title>
  <programlisting role="winbat">
@c:\php\php.exe -q script.php %1 %2 %3 %4
  </programlisting>
 </example>
 <para>
  Assuming, you named the above program as
  <filename>script.php</filename>, and you have your
  <filename>php.exe</filename> in
  <filename>c:\php\php.exe</filename> this batch file
  will run it for you with your added options:
  <literal>script.bat echothis</literal> or
  <literal>script.bat -h</literal>.
 </para>
 <para>
  See also the <link linkend="ref.readline">Readline</link>
  extension documentation for more functions you can use
  to enhance your command line applications in PHP.
 </para>
</appendix>

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