PHP can't write files - php

I had a Apache HTTP server on CentOS, I installed PHP (yum install php) and then tested a simple script that writes text in a file, so I do
$file = fopen($filename,"w") or die("Failure");
The problem is that it's always a failure, even after I did a chown apache:apache /var/www/html/* or a chmod 777 * in that directory, so anyone knows a way to understand / fix this?
EDIT : So there the problem was thath the directory itself did'nt have the chown

It's hard to say what it is without the actual error message from PHP.
Have a look at this page:
http://www.w3schools.com/php/php_error.asp
Long story short, create and set a custom error handler, like so:
<?php
//error handler function
function customError($errno, $errstr) {
echo "<b>Error:</b> [$errno] $errstr";
}
//set error handler
set_error_handler("customError");
//trigger error
$file = fopen($filename,"w")
?>
In your case, I think that in order for it to be able to create new files in the given directory, you would want to add a '-R' flag to chmod or chown and call it on the directory itself rather than the children -- that way, if PHP has to create the file, it has permissions to do so.
EDIT: Just curious about why this has a downvote -- what is the "egregiously sloppy, no-effort-expended post, or an answer that is clearly and perhaps dangerously incorrect."? I told the OP to examine the error messages and set their permissions in a properly recursive fashion.

Change w mode to w+ - it will allow php to create file if it's not exist.
$file = fopen($filename,"w+") or die("Failure");

Related

Randomly arising "Permission denied" in php mkdir (windows)

I am wrestling with a problem. I stripped the example to this script that can be run as stand-alone application:
<?php
if(file_exists("x")){
print "<div>Deleting dir</dir>";
rmdir("x");
} else {
print "<div>Not exists</dir>";
}
clearstatcache();
mkdir("x");
If I call it repeatedly (F5 in browser) then sometimes this error occurs:
Deleting dir
Warning: mkdir(): Permission denied in F:\EclipseWorkspaces\Ramses\www\deploy\stripped_example.php on line 9
10-20 times it works OK and next time this error occurs. I googled more users has this problem but without solution.
https://github.com/getgrav/grav/issues/467
My example creates the directory in cwd, where anybody has full control. In addition the mkdir $mode parameter is ignored in windows. After the error the "x" directory truly not exists and in next attempt (F5) it is always created without error. I hopped later added "clearstatcache()" will help but nope.
In my full application I am using full file path. The deleted directory is not empty and I must clean it first. After successfull deleting the error occurs almost always.
My system is Windows 7, PHP 7.0.5, Apache 2.4
Windows doesn't let you delete things if another process is accessing them.
Check if your antivirus or some other process is opening the folder.
You can check this in resource monitor, from task manager.
Try the code with additional check on existing:
<?php
if(is_dir("x")){
print "<div>Deleting dir</dir>";
rmdir("x");
} else {
print "<div>Not exists</dir>";
}
clearstatcache();
if (!is_dir("x")) {
mkdir("x");
}
Had the same problem with Windows 10, Xampp and PHP 7. Problem was Kaspersky Internet Security, scanning and blocking the directory. Disabling KIS mkdir always works for me. Instead of directly recreating you can try rename, if disabling security software is not an option for you.
$time = time();
mkdir($path . $time);
rename($path . $time, $path);
juste delete espace name folder with Function Trim in php

PHP: Why is chmod() setting my file/folder to 555 or 444?

I created a web application with a file browser. I'm trying to add a functionality where the user can change the chmod/permissions via an ajax request which is handled via PHP on the back-end.
(Side Note: I'm running my local with WAMP)
So initially, I'm reading the permissions with this
substr(sprintf('%o', fileperms($relativePath)), -4)
to get this format (0777, 0644, etc), if not it returns something like 32726. This info is used to be displayed in the UI for the user to know whats current.
However, when I run the script, I set it to 0777 and it seems to run fine. But then when I read the file again, it returns 0555 or 0444. Anyone know what I'm missing?
Does your web server own the files it is trying to change the permissions on? You can check whether chmod ran correctly or failed by testing its return value. It will return FALSE if the webserver did not have permissions. For more information you can read: http://php.net/manual/en/function.chmod.php
<?php
$is_success = chmod("myfile.pdf", 777);
if($is_sucess) {
echo "success<br />\n";
}
I realized this was not an issue, but rather the chmod command does not work properly on a windows/apache setup.

Update JSON file with PHP

I'm very new to both JSON and PHP but I'm building a game that needs a seperate database that keeps track of the doors that are locked and unlocked in a maze.
My JSON file looks like this:
{ "doors":
[
{"left":true, "right":false, "bottom":false},
{"left":false, "right":false, "bottom":false},
{"right":false, "bottom":false, "top":false}
]
}
and my PHP file looks like this:
$jsonString = file_get_contents('info.json');
$data = json_decode($jsonString);
$data["doors"][0]["right"] = true;
$newJsonString = json_encode($data);
file_put_contents('info.json', $newJsonString);
I'm calling this using ajax in javascript and I can read the file if I use var_dump($data) but as soon as I try to edit the file I get a 500 error. I feel like I'm really close, but I'm just really stuck right now. If someone could help me out that would be really great. Thanks.
Are you running this in var/www through localhost or some other server folder? If so the web-process may not have sufficient privileges to write to the directory.
Edit:
If you are running in a restricted directory (e.g. var/www or outside you user dir) you may try and change the permission of the file you are trying to write to with something like:
(try this only cd'd into the dir where your JSON file is)
sudo chmod -777 info.json
(then enter your pw if you are a linux box)
Please be aware, though, that is for testing purposes only and may lead to security & performance concerns:
For more information about this particular level of security with file permissions please view:
In a PHP / Apache / Linux context, why exactly is chmod 777 dangerous?
A 500 error is an Internal Server Error. It usually means that there is a misconfiguration somewhere. The best way to debug it is by checking your web server's error log, it should tell you why it threw a 500 error.
Also, be aware that a json_decode() without the second $assoc parameter, returns an object rather than an array, so to overrule a key you'd need to set it as an object property:
$data->doors[0]->right = true;

PHP SVN Checkout via HTTPS

I want to create an SVN checkout PHP script. All you need is to call a function and pass two parameters: the SVN URL and the output path.
My problem is, that our SVN server can only be accessed via https. But through https, the function doesn't work. Normally the function should return a boolean, but I just get nothing. My first thought was, that I have no permission to write into the output path folder, but I changed the permission to 777 (temporarily). Still doesn't work. I also tried to get some files from another SVN trunk. Behold, this is working. I get the files. Any idea how to get this to work?
Aah, and yes, I set the svn trunk permission to read-write for everyone.
Here's is my code:
<?php
$result = svn_checkout('https://{LINK_TO_SVN_TRUNK}', dirname(__FILE__) . '/tmp');
echo "Result: ".$result;
?>
This is what I have used successfully in the past:
svn_auth_set_parameter(PHP_SVN_AUTH_PARAM_IGNORE_SSL_VERIFY_ERRORS, true);
svn_auth_set_parameter(SVN_AUTH_PARAM_DEFAULT_USERNAME, "username");
svn_auth_set_parameter(SVN_AUTH_PARAM_DEFAULT_PASSWORD, "password");
$changeLog = svn_log($path, $start_revision, $end_revision);
Please confirm if the extension is enabled. php.ini should consist of extension=svn.so or php.d folder should consist svn.ini with the line extension=svn.so. You can check for extension in phpinfo();

PHP file doesn't rewrite

I make a site map, and make it with php file, that generate it from mysql. I change host and now I have problem with writing into file. I can't understand something.
Here is my example:
<?php
$xml = 'bla bla xml'; //... some xml generating code
$fp = fopen($_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'].'/my_site_map.xml', 'w');
if($fp)
echo 'we opened it';
else
echo 'we failed';
$fwrite=fwrite($fp, $xml, strlen($xml));
if($fwrite==false)
echo "another fail";
fclose($fp);
echo "we done";
?>
The question is: my file my_site_map.xml have a permission 664 (rw-rw-r--), and I can't use this script if I open this php page from browser, so, if I try to do this I'll see: "we failed another fail we done"; But if I open this through crontab and see a log file, I can see this: "we opened it we done". I want exactly this but the main problem is that the file isn't have been rewritten. Why? And how can I fix this? Thanks.
My server is nginx not an Apache, didn't thought that this info will valuable
Well I don't have enough rep to comment so this will have to be an answer.
I'm going to take a stab in the dark and say the file is owned by your user or root, not the process that is running the webserver. Nor is the file owned by the group the webserver process is run under.
So either chown/chgrp the file to be owned by the apache(?!) process running, e.g. chown apache file or set the file to have write permissions to everyone, e.g. chmod 666 file
Don't chmod 777 as commented above unless it's an executable file and you want anyone to be able to run it. The 1st solution is a better practice than just giving anyone read access to a file.
Edit: In comment to the comments on the original answer above, if the file isn't an executable then don't give it 7 for any permisions. 6 is read/write and is suitable for a text file you are opening to write to (even 2 is if it comes to that).
Edit 2: Try catching any exceptions that your fopen function runs in a try catch block:
try {
$fp = fopen($_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'].'/my_site_map.xml', 'w');
} catch (Exception $e) {
echo "The error is" . $e->getMessage();
}
For PHP code here are the links to change it on the fly. You can change it to what ever make your edits then change it back as needed.
http://php.net/manual/en/function.chmod.php
http://php.net/manual/en/function.chown.php
http://php.net/manual/en/function.chgrp.php
Examples are included on each link with the documentations. Find the permissions that works best for what your doing. There isn't a one size fits all for permissions since it really depends on your end product (web app, page, what ever).

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