Date: 01/09/06 (PHP Community)    Keywords: php, web

I'm a programmer that usually codes in ruby or python not php so I'm all of you will be so kind as to help me find the php equivalents I'm looking for. Right now I need to send some http request. Python has urllib and urllib2 for these.

Basically, I need to retrieve a webpage with a php script. Something like $page = retrieve('http://livejournal.com') but i need more control. I need to be able to specify the http headers and such. Anyone know the php functions for this sort of thing? I know of the raw socket functions but I'm hoping for a more abstract method.

Side note, the docs on php.net are great if you know the function your looking for but not so great if you don't know the names of what your looking for :(

Source: http://www.livejournal.com/community/php/391045.html