standalone PHP programs?

[Melville]

I have done some web development using PHP and MySQL, and I have found it an excellent and powerful environment.

I am now in a position where I need to develop a standalone program to parse data from files and insert it into a MySQL database.

My question is: Is PHP suited to this task? Can I develop a standalone PHP program to open a file, read it, parse the data, and insert into a MySQL database, then move onto the next file in the directory?

If so, do I need a compiler or other such piece of software? Where do I find one? Are there any recommendations for a particularly good one? How do I run this program?

Thank you for your help.

Mel

[LordShryku]

You can run php from the command line....

[Truti]

You don't need a compailer, you need a Linux machine, with php moduls installed!

Then you need to "chmod u=x" and you can last it off as you want.

[erikwebb]

This may be what you're thinking of: http://gtk.php.net/