   #PHP Manual Filesystem functions pclose readfile

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                                     popen

   (PHP 3, PHP 4 )
   popen -- Opens process file pointer

Description

   resource popen ( string command, string mode)

   Opens a pipe to a process executed by forking the command given by
   command.

   Returns a file pointer identical to that returned by fopen(), except
   that it is unidirectional (may only be used for reading or writing)
   and must be closed with pclose(). This pointer may be used with
   fgets(), fgetss(), and fputs().

   If an error occurs, returns FALSE.

     Note: If you're looking for bi-directional support (two-way), use
     proc_open().

   Example 1. popen() example
   <?php
   $handle = popen("/bin/ls", "r");
   ?>

   If the command to be executed could not be found, a valid resource is
   returned. This may seem odd, but makes sense; it allows you to access
   any error message returned by the shell:

   <?php
   error_reporting(E_ALL);
   /* Add redirection so we can get stderr. */
   $handle = popen('/path/to/spooge 2>&1', 'r');
   echo "'$handle'; " . gettype($handle) . "\n";
   $read = fread($handle, 2096);
   echo $read;
   pclose($handle);
   ?>

   See also pclose(), fopen(), and proc_open().
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