What happens if php is not running?

Anon

Had a bit of a problem with a perl script not running, probably due to server maintenance or upgrading. Of course, because the perl interpreter was not available there was no informative message available and the user left hanging.

How would php handle this situation? If a user requests a php page and php for whatever reason is not available presumably the web server would still deliver the page, but take no action on the php code. What approach would ensure that sensitive code was not visible to the user, and how to inform the user that php is temporarily offline and to try again a bit later? Is this ever a concern in the php world?

Anon

If apache is configured to run .php files with php, then the script should be sent to the php program. If it is not able to run, the program won't give any output, so it wont send any output to the client. I've never actually seen this happen, so correct me if I'm wrong.

brandonschnell

if the php module fails or if apache is misconfigured then the source of the php files will be revealed.

if you're truely paranoid, create a script to see if a php page returns the correct result. if it doesn't, assume php is screwed up. either shutdown apache or change the webroot to only show a "We're sorry error..." html error page. add the script to crontab and have it run on a regular basis. now if a php fails to show an expected result the entire site will be taken offline.

Anon

Thank you for both comments. Since this is rented server space all I can do is make this suggestion to the person in charge of the server and its implementation.

Quite honestly I have had more problems with perl not being available than with php.

I'm coming at this from my users' point of view. In the perl situation the user is allowed to fill in the form and then gets a failure when the form is submitted. Disappointment and inconvenience are directly proportional (at least) to the length of the form. Better that you get the message at the outset that there is no point in presenting the form at this time, just wondering whether the preprocessing of php could help in this situation.

Anon

I've seen a situation on Microsoft IIS where PHP was shut down and the server revealed all the php code to the clients..