Thx wisewood. i will spend some time playing with that code. more specifically let me tell you what i need this for so maybe it will give you more ideas. i have the server, so everything on it is mine to start and stop. its a linux server. on it i have a website, TS2, irc. all running. i have ftp access, so its not a probelm getting permission on and off the server. i just want to put a panel on my website showing if ts2 and irc are currently up and running or if they are turned off. i always thought that since i could actually put a file right on the server it would just be a matter of creating a fake login script and if the login is successful, then it would submit back a true. and if the login failed it would return false. but im not sure how to create a fake lgin that will log out once its submitted back true or false. im not sure what i just said makes sense, im sure it probably confused everyone more. but again i will play with the script and see if maybe i can put in a INPUT type hidden with the ip of the irc and ts2 and maybe it will come back for each one. thx for the help so far though, i do appreciate it.