file() doesn't work

[Dave Moore]

Hi All,
Ok, here's my problem. I want to open a file and process its contents.
However, because it is possible that the file may not exist, I also want to
check whether the file() function is successful before attempting to process
any returned data from the file() function. The php file() manual page
suggests that it returns FALSE if it is unsuccessful, however this simply
doesn't happen on my system. My code looks like the following:
if (($file_contents =
(file("http://www.mydomain.com/some_file_that_doesnt_exist.dat"))) == FALSE)
{
echo "Your file doesn't exist!!";
}
else
{
do_some_interesting_processing ($file_contents);
}

Even something like the following doesn't work:

if (file("http://www.mydomain.com/some_file_that_doesnt_exist.dat") ==
FALSE)
{
echo "Your file doesn't exist!!";
return;
}

The file() function doesn't return FALSE as suggested.

So what's going on?. Why doesn't this work?. Is there another/better way of
knowing whether the file() function was successful?.

Regards,
Dave

[frizzle]

Wouldn't

if( !file('file.dat') )
{
echo 'doesnt work';
}

work?

[Janwillem Borleffs]

Dave Moore wrote:

Hi All,
Ok, here's my problem. I want to open a file and process its
contents. However, because it is possible that the file may not
exist, I also want to check whether the file() function is successful
before attempting to process any returned data from the file()
function. The php file() manual page suggests that it returns FALSE
if it is unsuccessful, however this simply doesn't happen on my
system. My code looks like the following:

It does work as is demonstrated with the following:

print file('http://example.com/lost') == false ? 1 : 0;

Have a look at what the file() function call actually returns (e.g., with
print_r()). Chances are that because of some directive, your webserver does
not return a 404 response code, but redirects with a 301/302 response code
to some other page.
JW

[Dave Moore]

Thanks. That seems to be working now.

Ta,
Dave

"Janwillem Borleffs" <[e-mail]> wrote in message
news:43***********************@news.euronet.nl...

Dave Moore wrote:

Hi All,
Ok, here's my problem. I want to open a file and process its
contents. However, because it is possible that the file may not
exist, I also want to check whether the file() function is successful
before attempting to process any returned data from the file()
function. The php file() manual page suggests that it returns FALSE
if it is unsuccessful, however this simply doesn't happen on my
system. My code looks like the following:
It does work as is demonstrated with the following:

print file('http://example.com/lost') == false ? 1 : 0;

Have a look at what the file() function call actually returns (e.g., with
print_r()). Chances are that because of some directive, your webserver

does not return a 404 response code, but redirects with a 301/302 response code
to some other page.
JW