NAME
    PHP - embedded PHP interpreter

DESCRIPTION
    The module makes it possible to execute PHP code, call PHP functions and
    methods, manipulate PHP arrays, and create PHP objects.

SYNOPSIS
            use PHP;

    General use

            # evaluate arbitrary PHP code; exception is thrown
            # and can be caught via standard eval{}/$@ block 
            PHP::eval(<<EVAL);
            function print_val(\$arr,\$val) {
                    echo \$arr[\$val];
            }
        
            class TestClass {
                    function TestClass ( $param ) {}
                    function method(\$val) { return \$val + 1; }
            };
            EVAL

            # catch output of PHP code
            PHP::options( stdout => sub {
                    print "PHP says: $_[0]\n";
            });
            PHP::eval('echo 42;');

    Arrays, high level

            # create a php array
            my $array = PHP::array;

            # access pseudo-hash content
            $array-> [1] = 42;
            $array-> {string} = 43;
        
            # pass arrays to function
            # Note - function name is not known by perl in advance, and
            # is called via AUTOLOAD
            PHP::print_val($array, 1);
            PHP::print_val($array, 'string');

    Arrays, low level

            # create a php array handle
            my $array = PHP::ArrayHandle-> new();
            # tie it either to an array or a hash
            my ( @array, %hash);
            $array-> tie(\%hash);
            $array-> tie(\@array);

            # access array content
            $array[1] = 42;
            $hash{2} = 43;

    Objects and properties

            my $TestClass = PHP::Object-> new('TestClass');
            print $TestClass-> method(42), "\n";
        
            $TestClass-> tie(\%hash);
            # set a property
            $hash{new_prop} = 'string';

API
    eval $CODE
        Feeds embedded PHP interpreter with $CODE, throws an exception on
        failure.

    call FUNCTION ...
        Calls PHP function with list of parameters. Returns exactly one
        value.

    include, include_once, require, require_once
        Shortcuts to the identical PHP constructs.

    array [ $REFERENCE ]
        Returns a handle to a newly created "PHP::Array" object, which can
        be accessed both as array and hash reference:

                $_ = PHP::array;
                $_->[42] = 'hello';
                $_->{world} = '!';

        If $REFERENCE is a "PHP::ArrayHandle" instance, then the newly
        created object is a pheudo-hash alias to the PHP array behind the
        $REFERENCE. If no $REFERENCE is given, a new PHP array is created.

    PHP::Object->new($class_name, @parameters)
        Instantiates a PHP object of PHP class $class_name and returns a
        handle to it. The methods of the class can be called directly via
        the handle:

                my $obj = PHP::Object-> new( 'MyClass', @params_to_constructor);
                $object-> method( @some_params);

        The relevant class constructor is called, if available, according to
        PHP specification, that is different between v4 and v5. The v4
        constructor has identical name with the class name; the v5
        constructor can also be named "__construct".

    PHP::Entity->tie($array_handle, $tie_to)
        Ties existing handle to a PHP entity to either a perl hash or a perl
        array. The tied hash or array can be used to access PHP pseudo_hash
        values indexed either by string or integer value.

        The PHP entity can be either an array, represented by
        "PHP::ArrayHandle", or an object, represented by "PHP::Object". In
        the latter case, the object properties are represented as hash/array
        values.

    PHP::Entity->link($original, $link)
        Records a reference to an arbitrary perl scalar $link as an alias to
        $original "PHP::Entity" object. This is used internally by
        "PHP::TieHash" and "PHP::TieArray", but might be also used for other
        purposes.

    PHP::Entity::unlink($link)
        Removes association between a "PHP::Entity" object and $link.

    PHP::Array->tie($self, $tie_to)
        Same as PHP::Entity->tie, but operates on "PHP::Array" objects.

    PHP::Array->handle
        Returns PHP array handle, a "PHP::ArrayHandle" object.

    PHP::options
        Contains set of internal options. If called without parameters,
        returns the names of the options. If called with a single parameter,
        return the associated value. If called with two parameters, replaces
        the associated value.

        debug $integer
            If set, loads of debugging information are dumped to stderr

            Default: 0

        stdout/stderr $callback
            "stdout" and "stderr" options define callbacks that are called
            when PHP decides to print something or complain, respectively.

            Default: undef

        version
            Read-only option; returns the version of PHP library compiled
            with .

DEBUGGING
    Environment variable "P5PHPDEBUG", if set to 1, turns the debug mode on.
    The same effect can be achieved programmatically by calling

            PHP::options( debug => 1);

INSTALLATION
    The module uses php-embed SAPI extension to inter-operate with PHP
    interpreter. That means php must be configured with '--enable-embed'
    parameters prior to using the module. Also, no '--with-apxs' must be
    present in to configuration agruments either, otherwise the PHP library
    will be linked with Apache functions, and will be unusable from the
    command line.

    The "sub dl_load_flags { 0x01 }" code in PHP.pm is required for PHP to
    load correctly its extensions. If your platform does RTLD_GLOBAL by
    default and croaks upon this line, it is safe to remove the line.

WHY?
    While I do agree that in general it is absolutely pointless to use PHP
    functionality from within Perl, scenarios where one must connect an
    existing PHP codebase to something else, are not something unusual.
    Also, this module might be handy for people who know PHP but are afraid
    of switching to Perl, or want to reuse their old PHP code.

    Currently, not all of PHP functionality is implemented, but OTOH I don't
    really expect this module to grow that big, because I believe it is
    easier to call "PHP::eval" rather than implement all the subtleties of
    Zend API. There are no callbacks to Perl from PHP code, and I don't
    think these are needed, because one thing is to be lazy and not to
    rewrite PHP code, and another is to make new code in PHP that uses Perl
    when PHP is not enough. As I see it, the latter would kill all incentive
    to switch to Perl, so I'd rather leave callbacks unimplemented.

SEE ALSO
    Using Perl code from PHP:
    <http://www.zend.com/php5/articles/php5-perl.php>

COPYRIGHT
    Copyright (c) 2005 catpipe Systems ApS. All rights reserved.

    This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
    under the same terms as Perl itself.

AUTHOR
    Dmitry Karasik <dk@catpipe.net>