bookmark: fork cli php script from webserver php script

fork-cli-php-script-from-webserver-php-script.php

//fork a CLI script from a webserver PHP script using the popen() function
//This allows to nicely transfer parameters to the new script instance like this:
$bgproc = popen('php "/my/path/my-bckgrnd-proc.php"', 'w');
if($bgproc===false){
  die('Could not open bgrnd process');
}else{
  // send params through stdin pipe to bgrnd process:
  $p1 = serialize($param1);
  $p2 = serialize($param2);
  $p3 = serialize($param3);
  fwrite($bgproc, $p1 . "\n" . $p2 . "\n" . $p3 . "\n");
  pclose($bgproc);
}

//In the CLI script receive these params like this:
$fp = fopen('php://stdin', 'r');
$param1 = unserialize(fgets($fp));
$param2 = unserialize(fgets($fp));
$param3 = unserialize(fgets($fp));
fclose($fp);
//...and do anything with them that would take to long under webserver control.