application wide var scope

arguile

Is there currently any system for application/server scope vars? In JSP (among other languages) I'm used to being able to define a variable and have it persist across requests. In a previous post this topic was covered but never resolved, as well I believe it was posted back at PHP3. To that end I'll trash the following ideas covered in it (among others 😉 :

Session variables are all fine per client, but I need something that retains it state over the entire application.

I don't want a constant, variables are needed. Yes this opens the whole multithreaded environment, memmory locking bag of worms; which is hopefully dealt w/ in a nice function lib.

Opening a text file, or using a db will not work. Even if the overhead is low for text files, when you consider how much lower memmory access is (especially for larger data sets) it makes more sense in many cases. Also locking and unlocking them for write access makes it even slower.

The shm_() shared memory functions are *nix specific. While this is fine in most cases I really don't want to limit the platform unless absolutely necessary.

What I'm looking for is a set system for handling application/server wide variables w/ all the locking involved taken care of (read/exclusive). At this point in time I'm not overly concerned w/ security as most of the application will have dedicated servers. However, if there's already a system in place to deal w/ shared environments I won't complain 🙂. I'm going to assume PHP4 has no such functioning as I can find no documentation of it. So what I guess I'm really asking is are there any multi-platform addons or libraries out there that support this?

If anyone can point me in the right direction I'd be appreciative; if you have code I'd be estatic 🙂.

Thanks for your time.

(it's really really late here and I haven't had my caffine intake, so if anything is fuzzy and unclear... I'm blaming it on lack of coffee beans)

Anon

Quote:

Session variables are all fine per client, but I need something that retains it state over the entire application.

Unless you intend to share variables between multiple clients, PHP's native session functions are more than appropriate for the task. Additionally, you can always employ cookies as an alternative.

arguile

Thanks, but as I stated: "Session variables are all fine per client, but I need something that retains it state over the entire application." Cookies are the same thing, they aren't variables application wide, they're per client.

So in other words, sessions don't cut it. I do intend to share variables between multiple clients. Hmmm... I'll probably just go back to JSP or the like for applications requiring this, was just hoping PHP had something along these lines as I find it's much faster dev (CF I know has an application scope and query caching, but it's out of the running in this particular case).

Thanks anyways.

kparker

Here's your chance for fame and fortune--mmmm, well, fame at least.

(1) Write some Windows-specific modules that allow you to access shared memory and semaphores on Windows.

(2) Write a generic interface that hides the differences between (1) and the sem and shmop functions for unix.

If you're in a hurry, just use shmop and sem and you'll have it working as desired on unix at least.

arguile

Thanks, no hurry for win32 specific... just evaluating the languages for this architecture. It's not expected to go win32 but clients sometimes have their wonderful way of completely changing the platform b/c their Newest Shiney Toy™ only works on a platform other than everything else.

As for writing a win specific lib, hehe... that's isn't happening here any time soon. 😉

erebos

Hello

Ive made a class for php that lets you have application wide variables

http://www.phpbuilder.com/snippet/detail.php?type=snippet&id=259

Warning its still underdevelopment, but it gives you application variables.

/fredrik

Anon

Did you come up with a solution or did you revert to java? I just posted the same question yesterday..

techsoldaten

Hi, I use PHP infrequently compared to ASP or Cold Fusion exactly because of the lack of application scope. For that matter, also because there is no request scope - a variable that exists for the time it takes to build a page.

The main product I support stores arrays of data in cold Fusion application variables and does all of it's queries against those arrays. There are fewer round trips to the server and FAR less overhead because of the fact these variables are not being built each time a page loads. We have a trigger set on the database to refresh them every time important data is modified (i.e. a new business unit added, a new report becomes available, etc.)

We also use request variables all over the place. Not only do they cut down on total memory size in that they disappear once the page has loaded, but they are also extremely important in some types of conditional processing.

Without trying to sound too critical, I really have to wonder why something as critical as an application scope could be overlooked for so long? I see a lot of suggested work arounds that just seem to ignore the benefits of what such a scope would bring; prehaps PHP is not really ready for the big time yet at all?

Mike Haggerty
Senior Manager, Web Information Technology
Nucleus Technologies, Inc.

Anon

Yep, PHP is definitely a toy still.. and i needed the application scope so bad, as i can see (i haven't seen php for a while) still nada🙂

techsoldaten

I would not call it a toy, just an open source alternative that is still evolving. It is conversations like this that make me wonder if PHP really has a face that different from some of alternatives.

If you look at all that PHP actually does besides generate Web sites, you can see its value. It is just PHP in the enterprise that I find so disturbing - ASP and CF have so much on it in terms of scale that I can not choose to use PHP in my everyday work.

What I use PHP for is generating dynamic images and flash files, some file manipulation, and very small sites with little traffic and no real transactional component.

An application scope would be nice, and without it I have trouble justifying a decision to use PHP. But that is just the start; I really wish someone would really examine the language for it's potential for use in the enterprise and see where that gets us.