Using gd library under windows

[Anon]

I would like to know if someone managed to use gd library under Windows. I am trying to do that since two months, and I think it works only under Linux.
But I hope always using this library within the ten next years...

[Anon]

Okay, here's what I did. It doesn't sound pretty, but it worked. I am now running GD library successfully with Win 95/98 and PWS.

1) Find the php_gd.dll file and put it into your php installation directory. If you have an early version of PHP4, you may already have this file. If not, you can do what I did, and go to http://php.weblogs.com/easywindows/ and download their PHP Installer for PHP 4.02. This will reinstall PHP on your system, but in the process you will get the php_gd.dll file. I just saved a backup of all my php files, installed the PHP Installer program, copied out the php_gd.dll file, uninstalled PHP Installer, and then copied my files back. Yes it was painful, but it worked.

2) Edit your php.ini file as follows:
a. Make sure default_mimetype is blank (i.e., not set to output text/html).
b. Enter your extension directory, i.e., the location of the php_gd.dll file. For me, this was extension_dir=c:\php.

c. Uncomment the extension=php_gd.dll line.

3) Reboot. You can run phpinfo() to see if the GD library installed correctly. If so, the gd section should be displayed right after the PHP core section.

One gotcha I ran into is that I didn't initially change the header information of my php pages to allow it to output JPEG, PNG, etc. instead of text. This caused me to get an error message reading "Unknown list entry type in request shutdown" which took a while to figure out. For example, the proper header for a page outputting a JPEG is 'Header( "Content-type: image/jpeg");'.

Hope this helps. Let me know if you have any questions. I was able to get it to work and was drawing pie graphs by the end of the weekend.

[Anon]

can't you just copy someone else's php_gd.dll file rather then installing the php Installer and then uninstalling it to get the php_gd.dll file?

it may work...I haven't tried it yet!

[Anon]

Well, sure, Danny, suggest the easy way! I didn't do it that way because I didn't have a "someone else" to get the php_gd.dll from. But I'll put my php_gd.dll file up at http://mfast.home.texas.net/ftp/php_gd.dll.

[Anon]

Hey...

I got the GD library to work under windows, in that I can draw simple shapes and output them in png's. Whenever I use the truetype functions it says it cannot find the ttf file. Has anyone else seen this?

Dan

[Anon]

Mike,

I have installed the php_gd.dll into my php on windows, but when I tried to run a php script with gd functions in it, I get an internal server error.

Can you tell me what is the problem?

I have included the code in here:

<?php

 /* We load a small GIf file to be expanded into a larger file and calculate
    the width and height of the image */
 $size = GetImageSize("small.gif");
 $im_in = ImageCreateFromGif("small.gif");

 /* Set the height and width of the output image to four times
    those of the input */
 $im_out = ImageCreate($size[0] * 4, $size[1] * 4);

 // Now to copy the smaller image, but four times larger
 ImageCopyResized($im_out, $im_in, 0, 0, 0, 0, $size[0] * 4, $size[1] * 4,
                  $size[0], $size[1]);  
 ImageGif($im_out, "large.gif");
 ImageDestroy($im_in);
 ImageDestroy($im_out);

?>

<IMG SRC="small.gif" BORDER=0>
<IMG SRC="large.gif" BORDER=0>

[Anon]

To remove the obvious, the code does work on the linux build, just crapps out on windows.

[Anon]

I can see two possible problems.

One is that the version of the php_gd.dll I have does not support GIF format. I have GD version 1.6.2. I think GD eliminated GIF support around version 1.3 due to copyright problems. You can check your GD version by running phpinfo(). I use JPEG or PNG format instead.

The other is that you are not outputting a header to tell the browser that you are sending it GIF (or JPEG or PNG) instead of HTML. Reference my first message in this thread for what to do about that.

[Anon]

Mike,

I tried to use the code from your first message, but I still get the internal server error. Do you know why?

<?php

Header( "Content-type: image/png");

// create image
$image = imagecreate(200,200);

// create color R=100, G=0, R=0
$maroon = ImageColorAllocate($image,100,0,0);

// create color R=255, G=255, R=255
$white = ImageColorAllocate($image,255,255,255);

// create white background
ImageFilledRectangle($image,0,0,200,200,$white);

// create frame
ImageRectangle($image,10,10,190,190,$maroon);

// create inner rectangle
ImageFilledRectangle($image,50,50,150,150,$maroon);

// render image
ImagePNG($image);

// cleanup memory
ImageDestroy($image);
?>

[Anon]

Can you look in your php.ini file and make sure it looks something like mine, with the "text/html" commented out so that default_mimetype is NOT set.

; As of 4.0b4, PHP always outputs a character encoding by default in
; the Content-type: header. To disable sending of the charset, simply
; set it to be empty.
; PHP's built-in default is text/html
default_mimetype = ;"text/html"
;default_charset = "iso-8859-1"

If you make sure you are not setting a default mimetype and still get the error, then copy the text of the error message here for me, and I'll see what I can do.

[Anon]

I had the same problem as Danny, even when I removed the default mimetype I got the internal server error, BUT when I in the php.ini changed the order of the extension loaded, it worked. The trick is to put the line extension=php_gd.dll FIRST.

ex:
extension=php_gd.dll
extension=php_calendar.dll
extension=php_ldap.dll
extension=php_exif.dll
extension=php_ftp.dll
extension=php_imap.dll
extension=php_zlib.dll

Good luck fellas!
.:8):.

[Anon]

yes....

I have tried commenting the default_mimetype = ;"text/html", but it still have the error.

But changing the order of the extension did work. Thanks a lot.

Cheers people..keep in touch ...