Cron, PHP, and HTTP Headers, oh my!

Anon

Hello,

I have a 2 part question:

1)
I'm trying to run a php script via unix cron ... but is this possible when PHP is built in as an apache module? I'm thinking I'll have to use a PERL script instead (which I'd like to aviod).

2)
When this cron'ed script runs it will need to query my database and pass a bunch of parameters to a 3rd party form via POST. Since there will be NO user involvement (ie NO browser session) will this be possible? Will I have to hand craft the http headers?

Thanks again in advance. This site has been an invaluable resource!!

Cheers,
Bender2033

kparker

Your cron script can use lynx or wget to load the page required to run the script you need.
Hand-crafted HTTP headers are what I would do, but it doesn't seem that difficult to make them.

orpheus2k

1) To follow up kirk, wget is the way to go, only I would put a bit of security checking in the PHP script to prevent it from being run accidentally (or intentionally) by another party. You could check to make sure it came from a certain IP, or set some local environment variables to check against.

2) I've been using this class with great success for some time now. It makes dealing with POST a breeze. The instructions for use are in the comments:

<a href="http://px.sklar.com/code-pretty.html?code_id=313">http://px.sklar.com/code-pretty.html?code_id=313</a>

Good luck!

Anon

Thanks! That script seems to work well.... However the script that I'm posting to looks for cookies 🙁 . Is there any way I can simulate a cookie?

Thanks again!

-bender

Anon

I have the exact same problem..
As PHP can't receive cookies in the same way a browser does, I've been trying to work around it.
I tried posting a form using lynx, but even though I used options -accept_all_cookies and -post_data, I would get a "Successfully logged in" message back, but when trying to open a "members-only" page, it still view me as not logged in.

Anyone know how Lynx handles cookies?

Another thing I tried, was getting the members-only page with the above mentioned script, supplied with a:
header("Cookie: cookiename=value;");

It won't work. The result is the members-only page, displayed as if I wasn't logged in.

If anyone got a solution to this problem I'd be overjoyed if they would explain it to me 🙂

-=Dar=-

Anon

Well, I assume that the even though lynx accepts the cookie, it must just toss it away? Cause it sounds like when you goto the members only page that the previously set cookie (or accepted rather than set) isnt found.

Anon

exactly.
I don't know how to solve this problem, so if you find any solution please let me know 🙂

-=Dar=-

Anon

Hi.

I try to use this:
auto@~>crontab -l
0 /home/auto/mycmdfile
auto@~>cat mycmdfile
#!/bin/sh
/bin/date>>/home/auto/testphp.txt
/usr/local/bin/php -q /home/auto/mycmd2.php
/usr/bin/perl /home/auto/mycronperl1.pl
auto@~>

(See that much of above is for debugging).
This worked till my hosting service changed something (I don't know what), and it stopped working (incidentally, I use succesfully the same scripts on other of his machines). 'date' and 'perl' work, but not 'php'. Now he ignores me. So as suggested on this thread initially, using Perl (there is a test above) is a way to go, but my php script is very long and hard to change to Perl.

'wget' and 'lynx' are good alternatives, but don´t appear at my hosting service.

Any idea?

Anon

PHP is probably no longer available as CGI. The hosting company has probably upgraded and installed PHP as an apache module. Try the following code for details:

<?php phpinfo(); ?>

Cheers,
bender

Anon

Thanks for the answer.

I am not sure how to distinguish this:
-On phpinfo():
PHP Version 4.0.5
Configure Command: './configure' '--with-mysql' '--enable-track-vars' '--enable-force-cgi-redirect'
Server API: CGI
-On a telnet session:
auto@~/www/cgi-bin>which php
/usr/local/bin/php
auto@~/www/cgi-bin>file which php
/usr/local/bin/php: ELF 32-bit LSB executable, Intel 80386, version 1 (FreeBSD), dynamically linked (uses shared libs), not stripped

How can I know how php is installed?