iOS app causing internal server error - php

Question

I'm having a very strange problem. My app is causing my server to go berserk.
My iOS app uses TFHPPLE to parse data from a php page on my server. It grabs a name from the page, and checks how much time remains for that campaign.
NSString *URL1 = #"http://alefdev.com/tzedakah/current.php";
NSData *webPage = [NSData dataWithContentsOfURL:[NSURL URLWithString:[NSString stringWithFormat: URL1]]];
TFHpple *xpathParser = [[TFHpple alloc] initWithHTMLData:webPage];
NSArray *elements = [xpathParser search:#"//name"];
if([elements count] == 0)
{
NSLog(#"array is empty");
UIAlertView *alert = [[UIAlertView alloc] initWithTitle:#"Connection Error" message:#"Cannot connect to server."
delegate:self cancelButtonTitle:#"OK" otherButtonTitles:nil];
[alert show];
[alert release];
[adupdate invalidate];
rc.enabled = YES;
rc.hidden = NO;
}
else{
TFHppleElement *element = [elements objectAtIndex:0];
NSString *ttl = [element content];
NSLog(#"Charity Name: %#", ttl);
todayscharity.text = ttl;
}
Every 10 seconds, it calls to the server, grabs the info it needs, and puts it into an array. If the array is empty, the timer is invalidated, and a 'Reconnect' button appears. The 'Reconnect' button restarts the timer.
The timer:
-(void)starttimer{
adupdate = [NSTimer scheduledTimerWithTimeInterval:(10.0) target:self selector:#selector(updateAd) userInfo:nil repeats:YES];
NSLog(#"starttimer called");}
The restart function
- (IBAction)reconnect:(id)sender
{
[self starttimer];
}
If it fails (empty array) and then restarts, it tries again to grab info from my servers, but cannot. The entire site gives a Internal Server Error (500).
The php script gets the current date
$today = getdate();
$todayfull = $today['year'].$today['mon'].$today['mday'];
Checks the date:
if(($todayfull == 201192)||($todayfull == 201193))
Then echoes some text and runs the countdown function after matching the day.
function countdown($year, $month, $day, $hour, $minute)
{
$the_countdown_date = mktime($hour, $minute, 0, $month, $day, $year, -1);
$today = time();
$difference = $the_countdown_date - $today;
if ($difference < 0) $difference = 0;
$days_left = floor($difference/60/60/24);
$hours_left = floor(($difference - $days_left*60*60*24)/60/60);
$minutes_left = floor(($difference - $days_left*60*60*24 - $hours_left*60*60)/60);
if($minutes_left < 1)
{
echo "<ends>Less than 1 minute</ends>";
}
else{
echo "<ends>".$days_left." day ".$hours_left." hours ".$minutes_left." minutes</ends>";
}
Error Logs show:
[Sun Sep 4 14:01:53 2011] [error] [client 184.100.79.143] File does not exist: /home/alefdev2/public_html/error_500.htm
[Sun Sep 4 14:01:53 2011] [error] [client 184.100.79.143] Premature end of script headers: /home/alefdev2/public_html/tzedakah/current.php
[Sun Sep 4 14:01:43 2011] [error] [client 184.100.79.143] File does not exist: /home/alefdev2/public_html/error_500.htm
[Sun Sep 4 14:01:43 2011] [error] [client 184.100.79.143] Premature end of script headers: /home/alefdev2/public_html/tzedakah/current.php
[Sun Sep 4 14:01:43 2011] [error] [client 184.100.79.143] File does not exist: /home/alefdev2/public_html/error_500.htm
[Sun Sep 4 14:01:43 2011] [error] [client 184.100.79.143] Premature end of script headers: /home/alefdev2/public_html/tzedakah/current.php
[Sun Sep 4 14:00:25 2011] [error] [client 184.100.79.143] File does not exist: /home/alefdev2/public_html/error_500.htm
The full php script is:
<?php
$today = getdate();
$todayfull = $today['year'].$today['mon'].$today['mday'];
echo "Todayfull: $todayfull";
if(($todayfull == 201192)||($todayfull == 201193))
{
echo "<name>The Lone Soldier Center in memory of Michael Levin</name>
<description>Lone Soldier Center desc.</description>
";
countdown(2011,9,4,0,0);
}
else if(($todayfull == 201194)||($todayfull == 201195)){
echo "<name>Friends of Itamar</name>
<description>Friends of Itamar desc.</description>
";
countdown(2011,9,6,0,0);
}
else{
echo "Error: Could not match dates.";
}
?>
<?php
function countdown($year, $month, $day, $hour, $minute)
{
$the_countdown_date = mktime($hour, $minute, 0, $month, $day, $year, -1);
$today = time();
$difference = $the_countdown_date - $today;
if ($difference < 0) $difference = 0;
$days_left = floor($difference/60/60/24);
$hours_left = floor(($difference - $days_left*60*60*24)/60/60);
$minutes_left = floor(($difference - $days_left*60*60*24 - $hours_left*60*60)/60);
if($minutes_left < 1)
{
echo "<ends>Less than 1 minute</ends>";
}
else{
echo "<ends>".$days_left." day ".$hours_left." hours ".$minutes_left." minutes</ends>";
}
}
?>
My host (SiteGround) said that I just had too many IMAP processes running, but the site only ever crashes if I try to reconnect thru this app.

Answer 1

There's two things going on. First, you're getting too many calls to the server, so I think your timer invalidation isn't working right. Second, your PHP script isn't putting out proper header, so you're getting server errors.