Include Files

RoadKingHD

Hello,

Many of my scripts use include() or require_once() to include functions common to the application. In the past I have used include() or require() etc. for just those functions that particular script may need. I have many function files, some of which may have just one function, others may have many functions.

Getting to the point here! I have started to wonder if it might be just as well to have one file with all functions for a particular application and include it in every script?

Thoughts?
How do you do this?
Is it better to keep scripts lean or is this really a concern?

How much is too much when it comes to PHP script size/lines of code?

Kevin

🆒

raymie

I suspect that the answer is 'depends'.

The speed of PHP processing will depend on your server and it's load and so there is no fixed answer.

I understand the reasons for keeping everything in one include file but it really is a bit of overkill if you end up with a lot of unused code on each page.

RoadKingHD

I agree, "It depends" is ture.

With respectable server resources, is there going to be a big
(noticeable) difference parsing say 1000 lines of code compared
to 500? What about 4000 lines of code rather than 1000?

Anyone have any comments / experience with this?

What's the longest script (lines of code) you have used in one
file? Was it slow (realitve to server resources) or did it run
OK?

raymie

if the code is unexecuted that on a decent server there would probably not be much difference between 1000 and 4000 lines of code in the grand scheme of things.

If however that code got thousands of page requests at the same time from different users then it would be significant.

All in all however 4,000 lines is a reasonable small program, if you want to go with everything in one file then so be it, you can always split it up again if you find it starts to affect performance.