Make a PHP GET request from a PHP script and exit - php

Question

Is there something simpler than the following.
I am trying to make a GET request to a PHP script and then exit the current script.
I think this is a job for CURL but is there something simpler as I don't want to really worry about enabling the CURL php extension?
In addition, will the below start the PHP script and then just come back and not wait for it to finish?
//set GET variables
$url = 'http://domain.com/get-post.php';
$fields = array(
'lname'=>urlencode($last_name),
'fname'=>urlencode($first_name)
);
//url-ify the data for the GET
foreach($fields as $key=>$value) { $fields_string .= $key.'='.$value.'&'; }
rtrim($fields_string,'&');
//open connection
$ch = curl_init();
//set the url, number of POST vars, POST data
curl_setopt($ch,CURLOPT_URL,$url);
curl_setopt($ch,CURLOPT_GET,count($fields));
curl_setopt($ch,CURLOPT_GETFIELDS,$fields_string);
//execute GET
$result = curl_exec($ch);
//close connection
curl_close($ch);
I want to run the other script which contains functions when a condition is met so a simple include won't work as the if condition wraps around the functions, right?
Please note, I am on windows machine and the code I am writing will only be used on a Windows OS.
Thanks all for any help and advice

Answer 1

$url = 'http://domain.com/get-post.php?lname=' . urlencode($last_name) . '&fname=' . urlencode($first_name);
$html = file_get_contents($url);
If you want to use the query string assembly method (from the code you posted):
//set GET variables
$url = 'http://domain.com/get-post.php';
$fields = array(
'lname'=>urlencode($last_name),
'fname'=>urlencode($first_name)
);
//url-ify the data for the GET
foreach($fields as $key=>$value) { $fields_string .= $key.'='.$value.'&'; }
rtrim($fields_string,'&');
$html = file_get_contents($url . '?' . $fields_string);
See:
http://php.net/manual/en/function.file-get-contents.php