.php vs .php4

tydye

Hello,
I am trying to install a php shopping cart on my site & I am having no luck. The cart uses the .php extension, & Earthlink servers require .php4. I've tried changing the extension to .php4 ( PHPcart requires PHP 4.0 or higher ) with no luck. PHPcart support tells me they have not tried using the .php4 suffix with their cart & they do not know if it works or not & so they cannot help me with my problem.

Is it possible to get the server to recognize .php as .php4?
Server software is: Apache/1.3.26 (Unix) FrontPage/4.0.4.3 with PHP
version 4.1.2

I have talked to techsupport about this, 4 times, with a "None of us are trained in PHP" response. I have emailed the earthlink webmaster with the suggestions I found in this forum in the linux / unix server side installer threads about httpd.conf but the answer I received was kind of lame in my opinion ie:

"Thank you for contacting us.

The only server extensions that will work on our servers are those of PHP4. You will need to find out for sure wether or not the software will be compatible under this setting. It it is, I can see nothing wrong with using it as such. However, the technical support of the PHP should be done by the software developer. There is litte we can do with the server configuration to assist with this issue.

Thank you for your patience. Let us know if you need any further assistance."

Sounds like a generic "You're on your own" answer to me. I am now considering changing hosts. All of the PHP scripts I have found use .php, most pages I have run across use .php. Is it right that I should have to pay for a custom solution for every script I wish to use? I am learning about PHP but I do not have time to wait till I learn it to move ahead with my site. As of now I am working on getting my HTML in compliance with HTML 4.01 & XHTML in order to have as professional a site as possible for a small business owner doing it himself with an old Mac & SimpleText.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

Thanks,
tydye

the_Igel

As I know, you can try .htaccess directive AddType application/x-httpd-php .php. But it depends on whether you are allowed to create .htaccess files on your host.
Another solution is to rename all the files. But then you will surely need to Replace In Files "php" with "php4" in all the files of your PHPcart. It should work unless there is something very tricky in the code.

tydye

Thanks for the reply,
I've tried adding the following,
AddType application/x-httpd-php .php
AddType application/x-httpd-php4 .php
to .htaccess but to no avail. As a matter of fact when I use either code the pages with the php suffix that I try to access automatically begins to download.

I've tried renaming all the files, using SimpleText to find / replace in the code as well. This cart comes with an administration page for set up & I've even tried bypassing that & setting it up manually, all to no avail. When I change it to .php4 then at least I can view the admin page but I cannot save changes, & yes I have chmod'ed everything 4 or 5 different times. I know this cart works I've seen it in action on other sites. This is why I'm getting frustrated, all the PHP scripts I have found are using .php.

tydye