How do I write a command-line interactive PHP script?

Question

I want to write a PHP script that I can use from the command line. I want it to prompt and accept input for a few items, and then spit out some results. I want to do this in

Answer 1

One line of code (line 2):

<?php
    $name = trim(shell_exec("read -p 'Enter your name: ' name\necho \$name"));
    echo "Hello $name, this is PHP speaking\n";
    exit;

Checkout this answer's source in blog post How can I capture user input from the cmd line using PHP?.

Answer 2

I found an example on PHP.net, Utiliser PHP en ligne de commande:

$handle = fopen("php://stdin", "r");
$line = fgets($handle);
if (trim($line) != 'yes') {
...

Answer 3

Simple:

#!/usr/bin/php
<?php
define('CONFIRMED_NO', 1);

while (1) {
    fputs(STDOUT, "\n"."***WARNING***: This action causes permanent data deletion.\nAre you sure you're not going to wine about it later? [y,n]: ");

    $response = strtolower(trim(fgets(STDIN)));
    if( $response == 'y' ) {
        break;
    } elseif( $response == 'n' ) {
        echo "\n",'So I guess you changed your mind eh?', "\n";
        exit (CONFIRMED_NO);
    } else {
        echo "\n", "Dude, that's not an option you idiot. Let's try this again.", "\n";
        continue;
    }
}

echo "\n","You're very brave. Let's continue with what we wanted to do.", "\n\n";

Answer 4

From PHP: Read from Keyboard – Get User Input from Keyboard Console by Typing:

You need a special file: php://stdin which stands for the standard input.

print "Type your message. Type '.' on a line by itself when you're done.\n";

$fp = fopen('php://stdin', 'r');
$last_line = false;
$message = '';
while (!$last_line) {
    $next_line = fgets($fp, 1024); // read the special file to get the user input from keyboard
    if (".\n" == $next_line) {
      $last_line = true;
    } else {
      $message .= $next_line;
    }
}

Answer 5

The algorithm is simple:

until done:
    display prompt
    line := read a command line of input
    handle line

It's very trivial to use an array that maps commands to callback functions that handle them. The entire challenge is roughly a while loop, and two function calls. PHP also has a readline interface for more advanced shell applications.

Answer 6

The I/O Streams page from the PHP manual describes how you can use STDIN to read a line from the command line:

<?php
 $line = trim(fgets(STDIN)); // reads one line from STDIN
 fscanf(STDIN, "%d\n", $number); // reads number from STDIN
?>