Question

I have to write a PHP script that works as a client against another HTTP Server. This Server ignores the HTTP Connection:Close header and keeps the TCP connection open unless it is closed by the client. And here is my dilemma. I (the client) have to deciede when a HTTP request/response has finished and then close the connection. Simply use:

$data = file_get_contents($url);

.. won’t work, as file_get_contents returns only if the connection timeout (default 30 seconds) has reached.

So I have to write my own read – loop like this (pseudo code):

$sock = fsockopen(...);
$data = '';
while($line = fgets($sock)) {
    $data .= $line;
    if(http_package_recieved()) {
        break;
    }
}

Unfortunately there is no Content-Length header in the response. My question is, how the function

http_package_recieved()

… should look like.

Greets
Thorsten

Answer 1

If it doesn’t close the connection and it doesn’t tell you the total length of the response, you have no way to know whether all the data has been received.

You could specify a maximum time interval between packets, but that won’t be reliable.