Php and tcp/ip sockets
This is a quick guide/tutorial to learning
socket programming in php. Socket programming php is very similar to C. Most
functions are similar in names, parameters and output. However unlike C, socket
programs written in php would run the same way on any os that has php
installed. So the code does not need any platform specific changes (mostly).
To summarise the basics, sockets are the
fundamental "things" behind any kind of network communications done
by your computer. For example when you type www.google.com in your web browser,
it opens a socket and connects to google.com to fetch the page and show it to
you. Same with any chat client like gtalk or skype. Any network communication
goes through a socket.
Before you begin
This tutorial assumes that you already know
php and also how to run php scripts from the commandline/terminal. Php scripts
are normally run from inside the browser by placing them in the apache root
directory like /var/www. However these commandline programs can be run from any
directory. They can be run from browsers as well.
So lets begin with sockets.
Creating a socket
This first thing to do
is create a socket. The socket_create function
does this.
Here is a code sample :
$sock =
socket_create(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, 0);
Function socket_create creates a socket and returns a socket
descriptor which can be used in other network commands.
The above code will create a socket with the
following properties ...
Address Family :
AF_INET (this is IP version 4)
Type : SOCK_STREAM (this means connection oriented TCP protocol)
Protocol : 0 [ or IPPROTO_IP This is IP protocol]
Error handling
If any of the socket functions fail then the
error information can be retrieved using the socket_last_error and
socket_strerror functions.
if(!($sock = socket_create(AF_INET,
SOCK_STREAM, 0)))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Couldn't create socket: [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Socket created";
Ok , so you have created a socket
successfully. But what next ? Next we shall try to connect to some server using
this socket. We can connect to www.google.com
Note
Apart from SOCK_STREAM type of sockets there
is another type called SOCK_DGRAM which indicates the UDP protocol. This type
of socket is non-connection socket. In this tutorial we shall stick to
SOCK_STREAM or TCP sockets.
Connect to a Server
We connect to a remote server on a certain
port number. So we need 2 things , IP address and port number to connect to. So
you need to know the IP address of the remote server you are connecting to.
Here we used the ip address of google.com as a sample. A little later on we
shall see how to find out the ip address of a given domain name.
The last thing needed
is the connect function. It needs a socket and a
sockaddr structure to connect to. Here is a code sample.
if(!($sock = socket_create(AF_INET,
SOCK_STREAM, 0)))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Couldn't create socket: [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Socket created \n";
if(!socket_connect($sock , '74.125.235.20' ,
80))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not connect: [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Connection established \n";
Run the program
$ php /var/www/socket.php
Socket created
Connection established
It creates a socket and then connects. Try
connecting to a port different from port 80 and you should not be able to
connect which indicates that the port is not open for connection. This logic
can be used to build a port scanner.
OK, so we are now connected. Lets do the next
thing , sending some data to the remote server.
Quick
Note
The concept of "connections" apply
to SOCK_STREAM/TCP type of sockets. Connection means a reliable
"stream" of data such that there can be multiple such streams each
having communication of its own. Think of this as a pipe which is not
interfered by other data.
Other sockets like UDP , ICMP , ARP dont have
a concept of "connection". These are non-connection based
communication. Which means you keep sending or receiving packets from anybody
and everybody.
Sending Data
Function send will simply send data. It needs the
socket descriptor , the data to send and its size.
Here is a very simple example of sending some data to google.com ip :
if(!($sock =
socket_create(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, 0)))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Couldn't create socket:
[$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Socket
created \n";
//Connect socket to
remote server
if(!socket_connect($sock
, '74.125.235.20' , 80))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not connect: [$errorcode]
$errormsg \n");
}
echo "Connection
established \n";
$message = "GET /
HTTP/1.1\r\n\r\n";
//Send the message to
the server
if( ! socket_send (
$sock , $message , strlen($message) , 0))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not send data: [$errorcode]
$errormsg \n");
}
echo "Message
send successfully \n";
In the above example ,
we first connect to an ip address and then send the string message "GET /
HTTP/1.1\r\n\r\n" to it.
The message is actually a http command to fetch the mainpage of a website.
Now that we have send some data , its time to
receive a reply from the server. So lets do it.
Note
When sending data to a
socket you are basically writing data to that socket. This is similar to
writing data to a file. Hence you can also use the write function to send data to a socket. Later
in this tutorial we shall use write function to send data.
Receiving Data
Function recv is used to receive data on a socket. In
the following example we shall send the same message as the last example and
receive a reply from the server.
<?php
if(!($sock = socket_create(AF_INET,
SOCK_STREAM, 0)))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Couldn't create socket: [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Socket created \n";
//Connect socket to remote server
if(!socket_connect($sock , '74.125.235.20' ,
80))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not connect: [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Connection established \n";
$message = "GET / HTTP/1.1\r\n\r\n";
//Send the message to the server
if( ! socket_send ( $sock , $message ,
strlen($message) , 0))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not send data: [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Message send successfully \n";
//Now receive reply from server
if(socket_recv ( $sock , $buf , 2045 ,
MSG_WAITALL ) === FALSE)
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not receive data: [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
//print the received message
echo $buf;
Here is the output of the above code :
$
php /var/www/socket.php
Socket created
Connection established
Message send successfully
HTTP/1.1 302 Found
Location: http://www.google.co.in/
Cache-Control: private
Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8
Set-Cookie: expires=; expires=Mon, 01-Jan-1990
00:00:00 GMT; path=/; domain=www.google.com
Set-Cookie: path=; expires=Mon, 01-Jan-1990
00:00:00 GMT; path=/; domain=www.google.com
Set-Cookie: domain=; expires=Mon, 01-Jan-1990
00:00:00 GMT; path=/; domain=www.google.com
Set-Cookie: expires=; expires=Mon, 01-Jan-1990
00:00:00 GMT; path=/; domain=.www.google.com
Set-Cookie: path=; expires=Mon, 01-Jan-1990
00:00:00 GMT; path=/; domain=.www.google.com
Set-Cookie: domain=; expires=Mon, 01-Jan-1990
00:00:00 GMT; path=/; domain=.www.google.com
Set-Cookie: expires=; expires=Mon, 01-Jan-1990
00:00:00 GMT; path=/; domain=google.com
Set-Cookie: path=; expires=Mon, 01-Jan-1990
00:00:00 GMT; path=/; domain=google.com
Set-Cookie: domain=; expires=Mon, 01-Jan-1990
00:00:00 GMT; path=/; domain=google.com
Set-Cookie: expires=; expires=Mon, 01-Jan-1990
00:00:00 GMT; path=/; domain=.google.com
Set-Cookie: path=; expires=Mon, 01-Jan-1990
00:00:00 GMT; path=/; domain=.google.com
Set-Cookie: domain=; expires=Mon, 01-Jan-1990
00:00:00 GMT; path=/; domain=.google.com
Set-Cookie:
PREF=ID=3c2e53ffcc387bbb:FF=0:TM=1342766363:LM=1342766364:S=DTuSOuahFqyd6vjp;
expires=Sun, 20-Jul-2014 06:39:24 GMT; path=/; domain=.google.com
Set-Cookie:
NID=62=HZWk5tBSunVEofFri475wbeCNiChGf_bs7Pz_Z32hfm-B-0M4JRhz-pptjtChOk6lVepLBhOtB2pNHCT5DynobfZaGQaPS5Dh9Rq4YAqt40hExsePHEyA0ECMKjq5KeE;
expires=Sat, 19-Jan-2013 06:39:24 GMT; path=/; domain=.google.com; HttpOnly
P3P: CP="This is not a P3P policy! See
http://www.google.com/support/accounts/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=151657
for more info."
Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2012 06:39:24 GMT
Server: gws
Content-Length: 221
X-XSS-Protection: 1; mode=block
X-Frame-Options: SAMEORIGIN
<HTML><HEAD><meta
http-equiv="content-type"
content="text/html;charset=utf-8">
<TITLE>302
Moved</TITLE></HEAD><BODY>
<H1>302 Moved</H1>
The document has moved
<A
HREF="http://www.google.co.in/">here</A>.
</BODY>
We can see what reply was send by the server.
It looks something like Html, well IT IS html. Google.com replied with the
content of the page we requested. Quite simple!
Now that we have received our reply, its time
to close the socket.
Close socket
Function socket_close is used to close the socket.
Thats it.
Lets Revise
So in the above
example we learned how to :
1. Create a socket
2. Connect to remote server
3. Send some data
4. Receive a reply
Its useful to know
that your web browser also does the same thing when you open www.google.com
This kind of socket activity represents a CLIENT. A client is a
system that connects to a remote system to fetch data.
The other kind of
socket activity is called a SERVER. A server is a system that uses sockets to receive incoming
connections and provide them with data. It is just the opposite of Client. So
www.google.com is a server and your web browser is a client. Or more
technically www.google.com is a HTTP Server and your web browser is an HTTP
client.
Now its time to do some server tasks using
sockets. But before we move ahead there are a few side topics that should be
covered just incase you need them.
Get IP address of a
hostname/domain
When connecting to a
remote host , it is necessary to have its IP address. Function gethostbyname is used for this purpose. It takes the
domain name as the parameter and returns the ip address.
Quick example
|
$ip_address =
gethostbyname("www.google.com");
// = 173.194.75.104
|
So the above code can be used to find the ip
address of any domain name. Then the ip address can be used to make a
connection using a socket.
Server Programming
OK now onto server things. Servers basically
do the following :
1. Open a socket
2. Bind to a address(and port).
3. Listen for incoming connections.
4. Accept connections
5. Read/Send
We have already learnt how to open a socket.
So the next thing would be to bind it.
Bind a socket
Function bind can be used to bind a socket to a
particular address and port. It needs a sockaddr_in structure similar to
connect function.
Quick example
if(!($sock = socket_create(AF_INET,
SOCK_STREAM, 0)))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Couldn't create socket: [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Socket created \n";
// Bind the source address
if( !socket_bind($sock, "127.0.0.1"
, 5000) )
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not bind socket : [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Socket bind OK \n";
Now that bind is done, its time to make the
socket listen to connections. We bind a socket to a particular IP address and a
certain port number. By doing this we ensure that all incoming data which is
directed towards this port number is received by this application.
This makes it obvious that you cannot have 2
sockets bound to the same port. There are exceptions to this rule but we shall
look into that in some other article.
Listen for connections
After binding a socket
to a port the next thing we need to do is listen for connections. For this we
need to put the socket in listening mode. Function socket_listen is used to put the socket in listening
mode. Just add the following line after bind.
|
//listen
socket_listen ($sock
, 10)
|
The second parameter of the function
socket_listen is called backlog. It controls the number of incoming connections
that are kept "waiting" if the program is already busy. So by
specifying 10, it means that if 10 connections are already waiting to be
processed, then the 11th connection request shall be rejected. This will be
more clear after checking socket_accept.
Now comes the main part of accepting new
connections.
Accept connection
Function socket_accept is used for this.
if(!($sock
= socket_create(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, 0)))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Couldn't create socket:
[$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo
"Socket created \n";
//
Bind the source address
if(
!socket_bind($sock, "127.0.0.1" , 5000) )
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not bind socket :
[$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo
"Socket bind OK \n";
if(!socket_listen
($sock , 10))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not listen on socket :
[$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo
"Socket listen OK \n";
echo
"Waiting for incoming connections... \n";
//Accept
incoming connection - This is a blocking call
$client
= socket_accept($sock);
//display
information about the client who is connected
if(socket_getpeername($client
, $address , $port))
{
echo "Client $address : $port is now
connected to us.";
}
socket_close($client);
socket_close($sock);
Output
Run the program. It should show
$ php /var/www/server.php
Socket created
Socket bind OK
Socket listen OK
Waiting for incoming connections...
So now this program is
waiting for incoming connections on port 5000. Dont close this program , keep
it running.
Now a client can connect to it on this port. We shall use the telnet client for
testing this. Open a terminal and type
$ telnet localhost 5000
It will immediately show
$ telnet localhost 5000
Trying 127.0.0.1...
Connected to localhost.
Escape character is '^]'.
Connection closed by foreign host.
And the server output will show
Client 127.0.0.1 : 36689 is now connected to
us.
So we can see that the client connected to the
server. Try the above steps till you get it working perfect.
Note
The socket_getpeername function is used to get
details about the client which is connected to the server via a particular
socket.
We accepted an incoming connection but closed
it immediately. This was not very productive. There are lots of things that can
be done after an incoming connection is established. Afterall the connection
was established for the purpose of communication. So lets reply to the client.
Function socket_write can be used to write something to the
socket of the incoming connection and the client should see it. Here is an
example :
if(!($sock =
socket_create(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, 0)))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Couldn't create socket:
[$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo
"Socket created \n";
//
Bind the source address
if(
!socket_bind($sock, "127.0.0.1" , 5000) )
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not bind socket :
[$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo
"Socket bind OK \n";
if(!socket_listen
($sock , 10))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not listen on socket :
[$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo
"Socket listen OK \n";
echo
"Waiting for incoming connections... \n";
//Accept
incoming connection - This is a blocking call
$client
= socket_accept($sock);
//display
information about the client who is connected
if(socket_getpeername($client
, $address , $port))
{
echo "Client $address : $port is now
connected to us. \n";
}
//read
data from the incoming socket
$input
= socket_read($client, 1024000);
$response
= "OK .. $input";
//
Display output back to client
socket_write($client,
$response);
socket_close($client);
Run the above code in 1 terminal. And connect
to this server using telnet from another terminal and you should see this :
$ telnet localhost 5000
Trying 127.0.0.1...
Connected to localhost.
Escape character is '^]'.
happy
OK .. happy
Connection closed by foreign host.
So the client(telnet) received a reply from
server.
We can see that the connection is closed
immediately after that simply because the server program ends after accepting
and sending reply. A server like www.google.com is always up to accept incoming
connections.
It means that a server
is supposed to be running all the time. Afterall its a server meant to serve.
So we need to keep our server RUNNING non-stop. The simplest way to do this is
to put the accept in a loop so that it can receive
incoming connections all the time.
Live Server
So a live server will be alive always. Lets
code this up
if(!($sock = socket_create(AF_INET,
SOCK_STREAM, 0)))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Couldn't create socket: [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Socket created \n";
// Bind the source address
if( !socket_bind($sock, "127.0.0.1"
, 5000) )
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not bind socket : [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Socket bind OK \n";
if(!socket_listen ($sock , 10))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not listen on socket : [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Socket listen OK \n";
echo "Waiting for incoming connections...
\n";
//start loop to listen for incoming
connections
while (true)
{
//Accept incoming connection - This is a blocking call
$client = socket_accept($sock);
//display information about the client who is connected
if(socket_getpeername($client , $address , $port))
{
echo "Client $address : $port is now connected to us. \n";
}
//read data from the incoming socket
$input = socket_read($client, 1024000);
$response = "OK .. $input";
//
Display output back to client
socket_write($client, $response);
}
We havent done a lot there. Just put the
socket_accept in a loop.
Now run the server
program in 1 terminal , and open 3 other terminals.
From each of the 3 terminal do a telnet to the server port.
Each of the telnet terminal would show :
$ telnet localhost 5000
Trying 127.0.0.1...
Connected to localhost.
Escape character is '^]'.
happy
OK .. happy
Connection closed by foreign host.
And the server terminal would show
$ php /var/www/server.php
Socket created
Socket bind OK
Socket listen OK
Waiting for incoming connections...
Client 127.0.0.1 : 37119 is now connected to us.
Client 127.0.0.1 : 37122 is now connected to us.
Client 127.0.0.1 : 37123 is now connected to us.
So now the server is running nonstop and the
telnet terminals are also connected nonstop. Now close the server program. All
telnet terminals would show "Connection closed by foreign host."
Good so far. But still there is not effective
communication between the server and the client. The server program accepts
connections in a loop and just send them a reply, after that it does nothing
with them. Also it is not able to handle more than 1 connection at a time. So
now its time to handle the connections , and handle multiple connections
together.
Handling Connections
To handle every
connection we need a separate handling code to run along with the main server
accepting connections. One way to achieve this is using threads. The main
server program accepts a connection and creates a new thread to handle
communication for the connection, and then the server goes back to accept more
connections.
However php does not support threading directly.
Another method is to
use the select function. The select function basically 'polls' or observers a
set of sockets for certain events like if its readable, or writable or had a
problem or not etc.
So the select function can be used to monitor multiple clients and check which
client has send a message.
Quick Example
error_reporting(~E_NOTICE);
set_time_limit (0);
$address = "0.0.0.0";
$port = 5000;
$max_clients = 10;
if(!($sock = socket_create(AF_INET,
SOCK_STREAM, 0)))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Couldn't create socket: [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Socket created \n";
// Bind the source address
if( !socket_bind($sock, $address , 5000) )
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not bind socket : [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Socket bind OK \n";
if(!socket_listen ($sock , 10))
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not listen on socket : [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
echo "Socket listen OK \n";
echo "Waiting for incoming connections...
\n";
//array of client sockets
$client_socks = array();
//array of sockets to read
$read = array();
//start loop to listen for incoming
connections and process existing connections
while (true)
{
//prepare array of readable client sockets
$read = array();
//first socket is the master socket
$read[0] = $sock;
//now add the existing client sockets
for
($i = 0; $i < $max_clients; $i++)
{
if($client_socks[$i] != null)
{
$read[$i+1] = $client_socks[$i];
}
}
//now call select - blocking call
if(socket_select($read , $write , $except , null) === false)
{
$errorcode = socket_last_error();
$errormsg = socket_strerror($errorcode);
die("Could not listen on socket : [$errorcode] $errormsg \n");
}
//if
ready contains the master socket, then a new connection has come in
if
(in_array($sock, $read))
{
for ($i = 0; $i < $max_clients; $i++)
{
if ($client_socks[$i] == null)
{
$client_socks[$i] = socket_accept($sock);
//display information about the client who is connected
if(socket_getpeername($client_socks[$i], $address, $port))
{
echo "Client $address
: $port is now connected to us. \n";
}
//Send Welcome message to client
$message = "Welcome to php socket server version 1.0 \n";
$message .= "Enter a message and press enter, and i shall reply
back \n";
socket_write($client_socks[$i] , $message);
break;
}
}
}
//check each client if they send any data
for
($i = 0; $i < $max_clients; $i++)
{
if (in_array($client_socks[$i] , $read))
{
$input = socket_read($client_socks[$i] , 1024);
if ($input == null)
{
//zero length string meaning disconnected, remove and close the socket
unset($client_socks[$i]);
socket_close($client_socks[$i]);
}
$n = trim($input);
$output = "OK ... $input";
echo "Sending output to
client \n";
//send response to client
socket_write($client_socks[$i] , $output);
}
}
}
Run the above server and open 3 terminals like
before. Now the server will create a thread for each client connecting to it.
The telnet terminals would show :
$ telnet localhost 5000
Trying 127.0.0.1...
Connected to 127.0.0.1.
Escape character is '^]'.
Welcome to php socket server version 1.0
Enter a message and press enter, and i shall reply back
hello
OK ... hello
how are you
OK ... how are you
The server terminal might look like this
$ php /var/www/server.php
Socket created
Socket bind OK
Socket listen OK
Waiting for incoming connections...
Client 127.0.0.1 : 36259 is now connected to us.
Sending output to client
Sending output to client
Client 127.0.0.1 : 36274 is now connected to us.
Sending output to client
Sending output to client
Client 127.0.0.1 : 36276 is now connected to us.
Sending output to client
Sending output to client
The above connection handler takes some input
from the client and replies back with the same. Simple! Here is how the telnet
output might look
So now we have a server thats communicative.
Thats useful now.