[SOLVED] reading another webpage.

[keeps21]

I have the following function.

 

It is designed to read a webpage and then show the contents.

 

It works fine on my localhost, but not on the live server, only outputting "Subject: ", $subject isn't shown at all.

 

Any ideas why?

 

<?php
function get_music_player() {
error_reporting(E_ALL);
$url = "www.example.com";

$subject = join('', file($url)); 

return "Subject:  " . $subject;
}
?>

 

The file using the function is as follows.

echo get_music_player();

[sloth456]

doesn't the url have to be prefixed with http://

[keeps21]

Oops missed that out when typing it in here.

 

It's in my actual file though 

[keeps21]

Amended the function slightly, still working on localhost, but not on the live server.

 

<?php
function get_music_player() {
$subject = file_get_contents('http://www.example.com/');
return $subject;
}
?>

[sloth456]

hmm, strange, looks fine to me.  Do you think maybe your host prevents outgoing requests like that?

 

Maybe you could try using cURL instead?

[premiso]

Are you on shared hosting? If so then chances are they do now allow fopen_url, they may allow CURL but for file_get_contents to work the server has to have that option set (you can do a phpinfo to find this out).

 

My bet is that is what is going on.

[keeps21]

Just checked my phpinfo.

 

Local server allow_url_fopen is on

Live server allow_url_fopen is off

 

So presumably and ini_set('allow_url_fopen') will sort out the problem.

[keeps21]

Are you on shared hosting? If so then chances are they do now allow fopen_url, they may allow CURL but for file_get_contents to work the server has to have that option set (you can do a phpinfo to find this out).

 

My bet is that is what is going on.

 

Ah you beat me to it I'll have a go at changing the ini.

[keeps21]

As I'm on shared hosting I cannot use

 

<?php
ini_set('allow_url_fopen', 1);
?>

 

Could any one enlighten me on how I would use curl instead of file_get_contents() ?

[premiso]

<?php
// create a new cURL resource
$ch = curl_init();

// set URL and other appropriate options
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, "http://www.example.com/");
curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_HEADER, 0);

// grab URL and pass it to the browser
curl_exec($ch);

// close cURL resource, and free up system resources
curl_close($ch);
?>

 

curl_exec

[keeps21]

Sorry I'm a bit lost,

 

Using the curl code posted above, how would I then echo out the contents of the page?

[premiso]

Nope. Your host must not like that/had issues with it in the past.

 

imo, switch hosts. There are plenty that at least allow Curl that are decently priced.  You can try using Sockets but I doubt they will work given that the latter two did not.

[keeps21]

Figured it out.

 

Edited the post before you replied - did a phpinfo on my local server - curl not installed.

did another on my live server and it is installed so i've got it working now

 

Cheers.

[keeps21]

Yet another question for you.

 

I'm noticing that curl_exec($ch) is outputting the contents of the webpage straight away.

 

How do I assign the contents to a variable so that I can then process it?

 

$contents = curl_exec($ch);

 

The above is just outputting the contents.

[premiso]

curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);

 

curl_exec and curl_setopt

 

Return Values

 

Returns TRUE on success or FALSE on failure. However, if the CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER option is set, it will return the result on success, FALSE on failure.

[keeps21]

Cheers.

 

Thank you all very much for your help