Question

i’m implementing in a project of mine an ip banning functionality.
First of all, i’d like to avoid .htaccess for this purpose ’cause the CMS probably would reset it upon modifications, so i have to use a PHP-send-header-and-die solution.
Obviously every HTTP request will be checked.

Considering an highly trafficated site, i have two solutions to store ip ban infos :

1 – In a directory, let’s say /bans/, i can create N files where N = number of banned ips, so :

/bans/23.23.23.23.ban

would ban 23.23.23.23, in this case all i have to do from my script is to check with file_exists, for instance :

<?php
    if( file_exists("bans/".$_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'].".ban"){
        header("HTTP/1.0 403 Forbidden");
        die();
    }
    else{
        // Continue surfing ....
    }
?>

2 – Use a MySQL table, let’s say cms_bans, and execute a SELECT for every HTTP request to check if the ip is in the ban list.

Considering those 2 solutions, which one has less overload impact (filesystem vs mysql :D), assuming MySQL query caching is disabled ?

Please only motivated answers, not just personal preferences.

Thanks

Answer 1

Use a MySQL table with the MEMORY engine. Dump it every once in a while to another, permanent table to keep the IPs stored and persistent after a server restart.