Access remote variable from text file

Starefossen

Ok, on one server I have a .txt file containing this:

<?php
$var = "123";
?>

What I want is to access this file form another server and print out the $var, is this possible?

laserlight

I suspect your script is actually:

<?php
$var = "123";
?>

Anyway...

What I want is to access this file form another server and print out the $var, is this possible?

If you are thinking of include or require so as to use $var directly, then no. You could use indirect means like having the script print the value, then having your other script read this value.

Starefossen

If there is a way to include the file, cant i just use echo $var; to display it?

How can I include the file?

laserlight

When I say include and require, I mean the [man]include[/man] and [man]require[/man] constructs. The problem is that using them remotely will just return the HTML output, not the PHP file.

Starefossen

Is there another way to store and access variables remotely / form extenal servers than?

laserlight

Is there another way to store and access variables remotely / form extenal servers than?

Of course, but it depends on what exactly are you trying to do. What are you trying to do?

Starefossen

Ok, this is for a version updater I'm making.

I have made one script that writes to a text file, new version number, type of update, download url and notes.

So I made another script, a version checker function to check for a newer version by checking this text file and the version variable. If there was a newer (higher number in the version variable) if would display the download url and type of update, notes and an image that with "an upgrade was available" text on, if not it should only display "version up to date" image.

But this isn't possible as the text file is rendered as html and the script dosn't find the version variable.

dagon

why are they not on the same server?

if the version number was just in a plain txt file just use file_get_contents()

Starefossen

The reason I'm not at the same server is because others will use this script and know when I have updates for it, it's a part of a huge project.

www.dev.starefossen.com 🙂

I'll just have to stick with the plain text and use file_get_contents() than, that was my original plan, but I wanted to make it a bit more advanced 😉

dagon

put it in a db and allow read access from the outside, advanced enough for you ;-)

Starefossen

My host dosn't allow me to make a user with read only rights... 🙁

But thanks for the tip 🙂

wilku

If you want to show the version to others, this is what I'd do. On the development server use a simple text file with version number:

version.txt

1.7

On the server where you want to check the newest version just read that file and you'll have your version number:

$new_version = file_get_contents('http://wwww.dev.starefossen.com/version.txt');
if ($current_version < $new_version)
{
//update
}
else
{
//you're good
}

Php treats varible types very non-strict. You can compare numbers and text.

Starefossen

Thanks, i'll do that...

Will this work on all servers?

wilku

No. Not all servers. In order for this script to work allow_url_open must be turned on in php.ini. I think it's turned on by default, but I'm not sure. It is needed, so that urls can be treated like normal files. More universal example (based on php doc):

<?php
$fp = fsockopen("www.example.com", 80, $errno, $errstr, 30);
if (!$fp) {
    $version = "unknown";
} else {
    $out = "GET /version.txt HTTP/1.1\r\n";
    $out .= "Host: www.example.com\r\n";
    $out .= "Connection: Close\r\n\r\n";
    fwrite($fp, $out);

$version  = '';
while (!feof($fp)) {
    $version.= fgets($fp, 128);
}
fclose($fp);
}
?>