get output line by line

Anon

I need to execute a command on the system. The command is going to ouput several lines with a delay between outputting each line. How can I display each line on the browser as they get generated (without waiting for all of the output)? Is this possible? I tried popen but it goes by block size rather than line by line output. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Anon

You cannot control that - it depends on the browser. In fact, either the HTML4.0 standard or XHTML 1.0 defines that the browser shouldn't produce any output unless it received the entire HTML file.

The only other way is to, for example, redirect the output into a file, and have the browser refresh every second or so, so that it can get the latest output.

Diego

van__

Wrong-o Diego!

you can do just this with the magickal powers of Output Buffering.

Here's a short how to with using IMPLICIT_FLUSHING:

<?
//start up the ob...
ob_implicit_flush();

/ You may need to send a "buffer-buster" to force output... uncomment if needed.
for ($i=0;$i<300;$i++) {
$str .= " ";
}
/

//write an html header...
$str .= "\n\t<HEAD>\n\t\t<title>BUFFER TEST</title>\n\t</head>\n<body>\n";

//and send your string...
echo $str;

//now start your looping for output...
for ($i=0;$i<80;$i++) {
//we snooze for a nice effect here...
sleep(1);
//and output...
echo "paahrtay!<br>\n";
}

//and wrap it up...
echo "<body>\n";
ob_end_flush();
?>

And there you have it, you can output lines all night long.

Anon

Thank you very much! I will give it a try. 🙂