Posted by CptDondo on 09/07/06 15:39

Jerry Stuckle wrote:
> CptDondo wrote:
>> Let me explain my situation:
>>
>> I have a PHP app that generates web pages on the fly based on some
>> data it reads from XML files. The pages are served up via a http
>> server and displayed with a browser.
>>
>> I've been asked to port this to an ANSI terminal-type display,
>> eliminating the web server and browser.
>>
>> Initially I thought about using C to write the app, but XML handling
>> in C is a real PITA, plus I don't get to reuse my PHP code.
>>
>> So, now I want to use PHP to generate those same pages except that I
>> don't want to send headers ever, and I need to loop waiting for
>> characters to arrive from the keypad and display pages based on those
>> chars...
>>
>> This is on an embedded platform, and I really need to be able to use a
>> single PHP binary for both purposes (the displays are interchangeable
>> at the hardware level; it all depends on what the customer pays for.)
>>
>> How do I get php to act as just another scripting language?
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> --Yan
>
> Yan,
>
> If you're running on a web server, the headers will always be sent. PHP
> doesn't send the headers, the web server does.

OK, I'll play with it a bit... I've never quite figured the difference
between php-cgi and php-cli. They both seem to do the same thing. As
my embedded system is tipping the scales at 32 MB, I am doing what I can
to eliminate unnecessary bloat....

>
> You can run it as a batch job, in which case the headers won't be sent.
> But while you'll probably be able to use some of the code, you won't be
> able to easily make the same program work both ways. At least not
> without a lot of if($onwebserver){...} else {...} constructs.
>
> Probably better to create two files and one or more include files for
> the code you can use in both.

Well, the idea was to split the existing code into a front end and a
back end, where the back end does the XML parsing and manipulation, and
the front end handles the display end of things.

That way I can reuse the back end code for both display modes without a
snakes' nest of if ... else... :-)

--Yan

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