php-cli for system admin?

[walterbyrd]

For real, could php-cli be useful for system admin tasks?

I doubt php-cli will ever match perl, or python, for a sys admin
scripting language. But, does php-cli come close enough to the sys
admin power of those languages that php might actually be useful for
admins?

As far as I know, nobody seriously uses php for a shell scripting
language. Is that just because perl is so well established? Or because
php doesn't have the power?

I have not been able to find much about using php for system admin, or
using php-cli at all. I googled around, but all I find were "hello
world" type examples.

[Dikkie Dik]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

For real, could php-cli be useful for system admin tasks?

Theoretically yes, but in practise...

I doubt php-cli will ever match perl, or python, for a sys admin
scripting language. But, does php-cli come close enough to the sys
admin power of those languages that php might actually be useful for
admins?

I am afraid that all depends on the OS and off course what you want to do.

As far as I know, nobody seriously uses php for a shell scripting
language. Is that just because perl is so well established? Or because
php doesn't have the power?

I *did* try it. There are things that should be done on a web server
with scripts, and PHP is the only language that is guaranteed to exist
on both the development machine and the servers the site has to be run
on. And PHP tends to be pretty OS-inspecific, so I wanted at least some
testscripts done in PHP. There are a few drawbacks:

- Parameters are not passed, unless you specifically call the language
interpreter. so "testdir.ph p somedir" will not see the somedir
parameter, but "C:\PHP\php .exe testdir.php somedir" will. I think a
sysadmin was able to fix this under linux, but I do not know how.

- When running windows, created directories are read-only. I had to
shell out to dos just to create a directory in a useful way. Off course,
all OS-independence stops here. Under linux, you can give the create
flags, but these are ignored in windows.

..., but all I find were "hello world" type examples.

Well, that will work, but the rest may requires som more testing, I'm
afraid.

Best regards

[Jerry Stuckle]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

Dikkie Dik wrote:

>For real, could php-cli be useful for system admin tasks?

>
Theoretically yes, but in practise...
>

In practice, yes. I do a lot of CLI scripts in PHP and they work quite
well.

>I doubt php-cli will ever match perl, or python, for a sys admin
>scripting language. But, does php-cli come close enough to the sys
>admin power of those languages that php might actually be useful for
>admins?

>
I am afraid that all depends on the OS and off course what you want to do.
>

I find I can do anything in PHP that I can do in the other languages.
Is there something you've found you can't do in PHP that you can in Perl
or Python?

>As far as I know, nobody seriously uses php for a shell scripting
>language. Is that just because perl is so well established? Or because
>php doesn't have the power?

>
I *did* try it. There are things that should be done on a web server
with scripts, and PHP is the only language that is guaranteed to exist
on both the development machine and the servers the site has to be run
on. And PHP tends to be pretty OS-inspecific, so I wanted at least some
testscripts done in PHP. There are a few drawbacks:
>

A lot of people use PHP for a shell scripting language.

- Parameters are not passed, unless you specifically call the language
interpreter. so "testdir.ph p somedir" will not see the somedir
parameter, but "C:\PHP\php .exe testdir.php somedir" will. I think a
sysadmin was able to fix this under linux, but I do not know how.
>

I don't know about on Windows (I don't have the file associations set up
to run them automatically), but they are on Linux. If they aren't on
your system, your system is broken.

- When running windows, created directories are read-only. I had to
shell out to dos just to create a directory in a useful way. Off course,
all OS-independence stops here. Under linux, you can give the create
flags, but these are ignored in windows.
>

As I said - I don't do them on Windows.

>..., but all I find were "hello world" type examples.

>
Well, that will work, but the rest may requires som more testing, I'm
afraid.
>
Best regards

But then I also don't do Perl or Python scripts on Windows.

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

[469]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

Dont forget, that PHP actually is not only web-based and cli based...
but GTK2 based ;) so not only yopu can use shell scripts to admin the
system... but you can do a pretty nice and helpfull visual app with
php...

actually i use PHP shell scripting to do remote administrative
tasks... like http://myhomeserver/scriptsfolder/thisaction... one of
them, backs up eve3rything (Postgresql, Mysql, webroot) if it needs to
wake up a service... it will do it backup and shut it down again...
and then scp me the files... to the pc i am currently on... (Usually
my laptop, or the house desktop)

also... setups for Webapps that i've made.... i usually create a lil
setup for em... so if i sold it, and the client doesnt needs big
modifications.. . i just... unpack, run... and the script does the
rest :p


belive me.. you can even create a filedownloader with php in like 15
mins... on linux... xD

[Toby A Inkster]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

walterbyrd wrote:

As far as I know, nobody seriously uses php for a shell scripting
language. Is that just because perl is so well established? Or because
php doesn't have the power?

I use it from time to time. Sometimes I use Perl. Sometimes I use other
things. Depends on what has to be done (some languages are more suitable
for some tasks) and what kind of mood I'm in.

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
Contact Me ~ http://tobyinkster.co.uk/contact
Geek of ~ HTML/SQL/Perl/PHP/Python*/Apache/Linux

* = I'm getting there!

[Toby A Inkster]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

469 wrote:

Dont forget, that PHP actually is not only web-based and cli based...
but GTK2 based so not only yopu can use shell scripts to admin the
system... but you can do a pretty nice and helpfull visual app with
php...

And of course, you can use the same backend code for all three interfaces. :-)

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
Contact Me ~ http://tobyinkster.co.uk/contact
Geek of ~ HTML/SQL/Perl/PHP/Python*/Apache/Linux

* = I'm getting there!

[walterbyrd]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

Thanks for all the responses.

FWIW: I did find some decent tutorials on the subect on sitepoint:

http://www.sitepoint.com/article/php-command-line-1

http://www.sitepoint.com/article/php-command-line-2

These tutorials go beyond "hello world" but they certainly don't
compare with the documentation given to using perl, or python, for sys
admin tasks. For example, there are at least two perl books
specifically dedicated to perl for sys admin. And at least a few
chapters in o'reilly books dedicated to using python. I think php
cookbook dedicates a chapter to php-cli, but again, it hardly compares
to all the docs I find on using perl for sys admin.

[Jerry Stuckle]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

walterbyrd wrote:

Thanks for all the responses.
>
FWIW: I did find some decent tutorials on the subect on sitepoint:
>

http://www.sitepoint.com/article/php-command-line-1

http://www.sitepoint.com/article/php-command-line-2

>
These tutorials go beyond "hello world" but they certainly don't
compare with the documentation given to using perl, or python, for sys
admin tasks. For example, there are at least two perl books
specifically dedicated to perl for sys admin. And at least a few
chapters in o'reilly books dedicated to using python. I think php
cookbook dedicates a chapter to php-cli, but again, it hardly compares
to all the docs I find on using perl for sys admin.
>

So? Just because you don't find books on how to do it doesn't mean it
can't be done.

For instance, it could also mean those other languages *need* those
chapters/books to teach people how to do things, and PHP doesn't.

I do a lot of sysadmin tasks, but have never needed a PHP book to help
me with them. Linux admin, yes. Php admin, no.

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

[Michael Fesser]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

..oO(walterbyrd )

>These tutorials go beyond "hello world" but they certainly don't
>compare with the documentation given to using perl, or python, for sys
>admin tasks.

How do you define "sys admin task"? If something can be done in Perl, it
can also be done in PHP. Running a PHP CLI script as root even allows to
crash your system if you're not careful. It's just another language with
another (IMHO much more readable) syntax, but still as powerful as Perl
or Python.

Micha

[walterbyrd]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

So? Just because you don't find books on how to do it doesn't mean it

can't be done.

But it indicates that it's not as popular, and there as not as many
pre-writen scripts. Another indication is the job boards, employers
want admins who know perl, or python (usually perl).

And please understand, I am not asserting that admin tasks can not be
done just as easily with php as perl. I am simply recognizing that
perl is much more popular for sys admin, and I'm asking if php could
do the same sorts of things.

[walterbyrd]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

How do you define "sys admin task"?

Actually, that is not easy for me to define. I can give examples:

- apply an update to 200 servers running the same version of Linux.

- remove a user from the LDAP directory.

- issue the same command on a series of servers, working from a list
of servers in a text file i.e.:

../docommand.php serverlist.txt "command"

- shutdown and re-start a process that takes several steps to shutdown
and restart. Best if this could be done from the process name.

- give me a report of all users who have not logged in within the last
seven days.

- give me a list users who have more than 100mb of files in their home
directories. If a user has less than 100mb of files in their home
directory, then set their quota to 100mb.

Please don't actually tell me how to do any of that. I'm just
wondering if those sorts of things can be done.

[Michael Fesser]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

..oO(walterbyrd )

>How do you define "sys admin task"?

>
>Actually, that is not easy for me to define. I can give examples:
>[...]
>
>Please don't actually tell me how to do any of that. I'm just
>wondering if those sorts of things can be done.

Yep, definitely. If you are able to call system functions you can do
absolutely everything. In some cases a particular scripting engine can
make things easier by providing pre-built extensions, for example DB
access, LDAP or RPCs. For all other things there's at least system(),
exec() or something like that to do it "by hand".

Micha

[469]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

You can also use ssh whithin PHP... and even... create an ajax driven
"frontend" that works as a console lol :p

Posibilities are innumerable, even you can take screenshots... and if
im not mistaken.. take also webcamshots... (FOr the hour-to-be works)

On Feb 25, 8:30 pm, Michael Fesser <neti...@gmx.de wrote:

.oO(walterbyrd)
>

How do you define "sys admin task"?

>

Actually, that is not easy for me to define. I can give examples:
[...]

>

Please don't actually tell me how to do any of that. I'm just
wondering if those sorts of things can be done.

>
Yep, definitely. If you are able to call system functions you can do
absolutely everything. In some cases a particular scripting engine can
make things easier by providing pre-built extensions, for example DB
access, LDAP or RPCs. For all other things there's at least system(),
exec() or something like that to do it "by hand".
>
Micha

[Jerry Stuckle]

Re: php-cli for system admin?

walterbyrd wrote:

>So? Just because you don't find books on how to do it doesn't mean it
>can't be done.

>
But it indicates that it's not as popular, and there as not as many
pre-writen scripts. Another indication is the job boards, employers
want admins who know perl, or python (usually perl).
>
And please understand, I am not asserting that admin tasks can not be
done just as easily with php as perl. I am simply recognizing that
perl is much more popular for sys admin, and I'm asking if php could
do the same sorts of things.
>

Not necessarily. It might mean that it's so simple you don't need
complicated scripts to do it.

And job boards are also not a good indication. They generally look for
things people don't already have available and know about. They aren't
going to ask for something they already have, or something they don't
know can be done (at least most won't).

As I said before, PHP is a perfectly good tool for doing admin tasks.

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