How to see if a PEAR package exists?

[Ming]

I want to know if some particular PEAR package (for example, DB,
XML_RPC) exists. How can I do that in PHP?

Thanks,

[Michael Fesser]

..oO(AnrDaemon)

>Greetings, Ming.
In reply to Your message dated Friday, December 7, 2007, 22:08:19,

>I want to know if some particular PEAR package (for example, DB,
XML_RPC) exists. How can I do that in PHP?

Try to include them and catch an exception. (As fast and dirty way)

Not that fast, since you also have to write your own error handler to
throw the exception.

Micha

[Toby A Inkster]

Jerry Stuckle wrote:

including a file which does not exist will not throw an exception.

My general method is:

$old_error_repo rting = error_reporting (E_ERROR);
include 'Foo.php';
error_reporting ($old_error_rep orting);

This will include a file without issuing any warnings if it's missing.

And then you just perform a test to see if something that you know is
defined in Foo.php has successfully been defined. e.g.

echo class_exists('F oo') ? 'Foo.php found' : 'Foo.php not found';

Some will simply recommend checking to see if the file Foo.php exists
before including it, but thanks to the include_paths setting, that's
easier said than done!

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
[Geek of HTML/SQL/Perl/PHP/Python/Apache/Linux]
[OS: Linux 2.6.17.14-mm-desktop-9mdvsmp, up 21:34.]

Sharing Music with Apple iTunes
http://tobyinkster.co.uk/blog/2007/1...tunes-sharing/

[Jerry Stuckle]

Toby A Inkster wrote:

Jerry Stuckle wrote:

>including a file which does not exist will not throw an exception.

My general method is:

$old_error_repo rting = error_reporting (E_ERROR);
include 'Foo.php';
error_reporting ($old_error_rep orting);

This will include a file without issuing any warnings if it's missing.

And then you just perform a test to see if something that you know is
defined in Foo.php has successfully been defined. e.g.

echo class_exists('F oo') ? 'Foo.php found' : 'Foo.php not found';

Some will simply recommend checking to see if the file Foo.php exists
before including it, but thanks to the include_paths setting, that's
easier said than done!

Toby,

@include 'Foo.php';

should do the same thing, but I haven't tried it. Rather, I use
require_once on all my files; there's a reason I include them - because
I need them.

But you're right - include paths make things very difficult to determine
if a file exists or not. You could parse the entire include path, but
it's a lot of unnecessary work.

--
=============== ===
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
js*******@attgl obal.net
=============== ===

[allain]

On Dec 8, 7:44 am, Jerry Stuckle <jstuck...@attg lobal.netwrote:

Toby A Inkster wrote:

Jerry Stuckle wrote:

including a file which does not exist will not throw an exception.

My general method is:

$old_error_repo rting = error_reporting (E_ERROR);
include 'Foo.php';
error_reporting ($old_error_rep orting);

This will include a file without issuing any warnings if it's missing.

And then you just perform a test to see if something that you know is
defined in Foo.php has successfully been defined. e.g.

echo class_exists('F oo') ? 'Foo.php found' : 'Foo.php not found';

Some will simply recommend checking to see if the file Foo.php exists
before including it, but thanks to the include_paths setting, that's
easier said than done!

Toby,

@include 'Foo.php';

should do the same thing, but I haven't tried it. Rather, I use
require_once on all my files; there's a reason I include them - because
I need them.

But you're right - include paths make things very difficult to determine
if a file exists or not. You could parse the entire include path, but
it's a lot of unnecessary work.

--
=============== ===
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstuck...@attgl obal.net
=============== ===

@include "Foo.php";
if (!class_exists( "Foo")) {
// Code to handle missing PEAR file.
}

[Jerry Stuckle]

allain wrote:

On Dec 8, 7:44 am, Jerry Stuckle <jstuck...@attg lobal.netwrote:

>Toby A Inkster wrote:

>>Jerry Stuckle wrote:
including a file which does not exist will not throw an exception.
My general method is:
$old_error_repo rting = error_reporting (E_ERROR);
include 'Foo.php';
error_reporting ($old_error_rep orting);
This will include a file without issuing any warnings if it's missing.
And then you just perform a test to see if something that you know is
defined in Foo.php has successfully been defined. e.g.
echo class_exists('F oo') ? 'Foo.php found' : 'Foo.php not found';
Some will simply recommend checking to see if the file Foo.php exists
before including it, but thanks to the include_paths setting, that's
easier said than done!

Toby,

@include 'Foo.php';

should do the same thing, but I haven't tried it. Rather, I use
require_once on all my files; there's a reason I include them - because
I need them.

But you're right - include paths make things very difficult to determine
if a file exists or not. You could parse the entire include path, but
it's a lot of unnecessary work.

--
============== ====
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstuck...@attg lobal.net
============== ====

@include "Foo.php";
if (!class_exists( "Foo")) {
// Code to handle missing PEAR file.
}

Which assumes "Foo.php" exists only once in the include path, and
defines the class "Foo".

Also, the '@' in this case hides an important error message; I include
the file because I *need* the file. If it's not there, my code is useless.

Your code is completely unnecessary and causes additional overhead in a
properly designed system.

--
=============== ===
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
js*******@attgl obal.net
=============== ===

[Toby A Inkster]

Jerry Stuckle wrote:

That's where we differ. I don't use optional classes. But that's not
to say there is anything wrong with your way - it's perfectly fine. Just
my personal preference.

Nor do I usually.

But for my Blog/CMS, I like to be able to take advantage of third-party
libraries that might be installed on the server, but without making my
code completely dependent on them. So the code checks to see if they're
available, and if so uses them. If not, then perhaps you miss out on a
cute little feature, but it's no big deal.

Another way to do this is to have some configuration file somewhere with:

$blah_module_is _installed = FALSE;

and later:

if ($blah_module_i s_installed)
{
include "blah.php";
blah();
}

but this requires the site administrator to manually enable the blah
extension. Perhaps I have been using Macs too much, but I think that
"detect if cool feature X is available, and if so use it without a fuss"
is a good philosophy.

Of course, there are some PEAR libraries that my CMS absolutely requires,
and in those cases it would of course allow for the error to be raised
when the included file is not found!

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
[Geek of HTML/SQL/Perl/PHP/Python/Apache/Linux]
[OS: Linux 2.6.17.14-mm-desktop-9mdvsmp, up 3 days, 23:42.]

Sharing Music with Apple iTunes
http://tobyinkster.co.uk/blog/2007/1...tunes-sharing/