Question

I have a long running PHP script that i want to be executed in background on server after a user action. and the user should be redirected to other page while command should be running in background.
Below is the code

$command = exec('php -q /mylongrunningscript.php');
header("Location: /main.php?action=welcome");

The above script is running fine, but page does not redirected until $command = exec('php -q /mylongrunningscript.php'); is executed.

I want that user should be immediately redirected to the welcome page.

Is there any other way to achieve this task.
The other idea is that that $command = exec(‘php -q /mylongrunningscript.php’); should be executed on welcome page, but welcome page HTML is shown after the command has executed. command takes about 5,6 minutes and this time page does not redirects.

I am On Cent os Linux with PHP 5.3

Answer 1

Can you try this instead:

$result = shell_exec('php -q /mylongrunningscript.php > /dev/null 2>&1 &');

PS: Note that this is redirecting stdout and stderr to /dev/null If you want to capture output then use:

$result = shell_exec('php -q /mylongrunningscript.php > /tmp/script.our 2>&1 &');

Alternatively use this PHP function to run any Unix command in background:

//Run linux command in background and return the PID created by the OS
function run_in_background($Command, $Priority = 0) {
    if($Priority)
        $PID = shell_exec("nohup nice -n $Priority $Command > /dev/null & echo $!");
    else
        $PID = shell_exec("nohup $Command > /dev/null & echo $!");
    return($PID);
}

Courtesy: A comment posted on http://php.net/manual/en/function.shell-exec.php