PHP Passthru Output Buffering Primer Tutorial
The PHP passthru command …
Execute an external program and display raw output
… is a good way for your underlying command line be expressed within a PHP web application executed in a web browser.
But that “raw” above is just that, very “raw” in that the neat reports you see with Linux and macOS commands (at the command line) will not show that neatly just by using “passthru”.
But you can use PHP output buffers as per (but there’s more) …
<?php
// whatis.php
// Supervise whatis command
// November, 2020
if (isset($_GET['insearch'])) {
if (urldecode($_GET['insearch']) == '') {
echo "<html><body onload=\" document.getElementById('insearch').focus(); \"><h1>Supervise whatis command</h1><h3>RJM Programming - November, 2020</h3><br><br><form action=./whatis.php method=GET><input placeholder='Enter whatis object' type=text id=insearch name=insearch value=''></input> <input type=submit value=Go></input></form></body></html>";
} else {
ob_start();
passthru("whatis " . explode("\n",explode("\r",explode(";",explode("<",explode(">",explode("|",str_replace("+"," ",urldecode($_GET['insearch'])))[0])[0])[0])[0])[0])[0]);
$var = ob_get_contents();
ob_end_clean();
echo "<html><body onload=\" document.getElementById('insearch').focus(); \"><pre>" . "$ whatis " . explode("\n",explode("\r",explode(";",explode("<",explode(">",explode("|",str_replace("+"," ",urldecode($_GET['insearch'])))[0])[0])[0])[0])[0])[0] . "<br>" . str_replace("\n", "<br>", $var) . "</pre><br><br><h1>Supervise whatis command</h1><h3>RJM Programming - November, 2020</h3><br><br><form action=./whatis.php method=GET><input placeholder='Enter whatis object' type=text id=insearch name=insearch value=''></input> <input type=submit value=Go></input></form></body></html>";
exit;
}
} else {
echo "<html><body onload=\" document.getElementById('insearch').focus(); \"><h1>Supervise whatis command</h1><h3>RJM Programming - November, 2020</h3><br><br><form action=./whatis.php method=GET><input placeholder='Enter whatis object' type=text id=insearch name=insearch value=''></input> <input type=submit value=Go></input></form></body></html>";
}
?>
… to effectively reinstate those carriage return/line feeds that make the “passthru” (underlying operating system) commands those neat reports appealing to our eyes.
Better on a local MAMP web server (under macOS operating system) is today’s proof of concept whatis.php‘s “whatis” command supervisor PHP web application for you to try out (or perhaps download to a local web server).
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