I was reading this link:

http://us2.php.net/manual/en/intro.sockets.php

which says:
Note: This extension has been moved to the » PECL repository and is no longer bundled with PHP as of PHP 5.3.0.

I checked the PECL link on that page and could not find any packages related to sockets. I searched, looked in the PHP, Streams, Web Services, Networking, System, and Tools & Utilities categories and found no mention of sockets anywhere.

To make matters worse, there is no documentation for any of these packages as far as I can tell.

What's the deal? Is PHP dropping socket functions?

    I doubt they're dropping support. More likely they haven't updated the PECL stuff to reflect the changes of 5.3.0. They're probably preemptively telling users that they should look for alternatives to using sockets, as later in PHP (6.0?) sockets may be completely dropped.

    Seeing as how php 5.3 isn't out yet, I don't think you're going to see PECL info until 5.3 hits the web.

      If they drop sockets, I'm pissed! I'm trying to write documentation for the software mentioned in my signature. If they drop it, my project is ruined.

      There are other socket functions like [man]stream_socket_server[/man] which appear to be an entirely different category. Should I rewrite my project to use those instead?

        I'm sure if they give up sockets, there'll be other functions to use (like instead of using DOM XML we now use SimpleXML) so the functionality will be there, but be replaced with something better.

          Just because it isn't bundled doesn't mean it won't still be available as an extension. However, I would recommend migrating to streams instead of sockets. I did the same migration myself a little while after PHP 5 came out and it wasn't bad at all. The stream functions are, for the most part, very similar to the socket functions, so porting from sockets is pretty intuitive.

            Ah ha!!! I see sockets are pretty-much the successor to streams sockets. I knew they wouldn't drop it all together but would move to something better 😉

              I see sockets are pretty-much the successor to streams.

              I think you meant to say: "I see streams are pretty-much the successor to sockets." 😉

                OK this all kind of confirms my suspicions. My project is hard enough to install...I'd hate to have to get some extension running too. This comment is a little disappointing though:
                If you want a high speed socket server, use the low-level sockets instead (socket_create/bind/listen). The stream_socket_server version appears to have internal fixed 8k buffers that will overflow if you don't keep up by reading.

                I'm wondering how one should deal with that.

                  read the buffer into a variable after like 7k.... just like you would with a file....

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