EXEC Function on a MAC command

skypilot

I have a web based application that requires my users to execute another program from within my PHP script. This is only necessary when the user of my program is running on a MAC. Question…..

It is my understanding that in order to do this, I need to use the function EXEC. I cannot find an example anywhere that indicates that this function will "execute" a MAC command. Can anyone let me know if they know for a fact if this function will work on MAC commands? FYI…..we are running on a Unix server.

elfyn

Hey,

If you mean that you want your server-side php scriptlet to execute a command on your clients-side Mac...Then the answer is you can't 🙁

PHP is a server-side scripting language and cannot run commands on the client-side (the Mac's browser)

If you mean you want to run say an AppleScript et al on your UNiX web server then again you can't.

HTH,

elfyn

Sorry I'm tired so I kinda didn't read the end of your post that well...bad me 😉

You might be better off using the system() function like so:

<?php

// get the user-agent
if (isset ($_SERVER))
{
  $ua = $_SERVER["HTTP_USER_AGENT"];
}
else
{
  $ua = $HTTP_SERVER_VARS["HTTP_USER_AGENT"];
}

// Check to see if we're running on a mac browser. Cant remember
// off-hand but me thinks there will be a 'PPC' in there somewhere
if (strstr ($ua, "PPC"))
{
  // run the command for your mac users
  system("run that command here");
  ...
}

?>

HTH,