(PHP 4 >= 4.3.0, PHP 5, PHP 7, PHP 8)
stream_select — Runs the equivalent of the select() system call on the given arrays of streams with a timeout specified by seconds and microseconds
&$read
,&$write
,&$except
,$seconds
,$microseconds
= 0The stream_select() function accepts arrays of streams and waits for them to change status. Its operation is equivalent to that of the socket_select() function except in that it acts on streams.
read
The streams listed in the read
array will be watched to
see if characters become available for reading (more precisely, to see if
a read will not block - in particular, a stream resource is also ready on
end-of-file, in which case an fread() will return
a zero length string).
write
The streams listed in the write
array will be
watched to see if a write will not block.
except
The streams listed in the except
array will be
watched for high priority exceptional ("out-of-band") data arriving.
Note:
When stream_select() returns, the arrays
read
,write
andexcept
are modified to indicate which stream resource(s) actually changed status. The original keys of the arrays are preserved.
seconds
The seconds
and microseconds
together form the timeout parameter,
seconds
specifies the number of seconds while
microseconds
the number of microseconds.
The timeout
is an upper bound on the amount of time
that stream_select() will wait before it returns.
If seconds
and microseconds
are
both set to 0
, stream_select() will
not wait for data - instead it will return immediately, indicating the
current status of the streams.
If seconds
is null
stream_select()
can block indefinitely, returning only when an event on one of the
watched streams occurs (or if a signal interrupts the system call).
Using a timeout value of 0
allows you to
instantaneously poll the status of the streams, however, it is NOT a
good idea to use a 0
timeout value in a loop as it
will cause your script to consume too much CPU time.
It is much better to specify a timeout value of a few seconds, although
if you need to be checking and running other code concurrently, using a
timeout value of at least 200000
microseconds will
help reduce the CPU usage of your script.
Remember that the timeout value is the maximum time that will elapse; stream_select() will return as soon as the requested streams are ready for use.
microseconds
See seconds
description.
On success stream_select() returns the number of
stream resources contained in the modified arrays, which may be zero if
the timeout expires before anything interesting happens. On error false
is returned and a warning raised (this can happen if the system call is
interrupted by an incoming signal).
Example #1 stream_select() Example
This example checks to see if data has arrived for reading on either
$stream1
or $stream2
.
Since the timeout value is 0
it will return
immediately:
<?php
/* Prepare the read array */
$read = array($stream1, $stream2);
$write = NULL;
$except = NULL;
if (false === ($num_changed_streams = stream_select($read, $write, $except, 0))) {
/* Error handling */
} elseif ($num_changed_streams > 0) {
/* At least on one of the streams something interesting happened */
}
?>
Note:
Due to a limitation in the current Zend Engine it is not possible to pass a constant modifier like
null
directly as a parameter to a function which expects this parameter to be passed by reference. Instead use a temporary variable or an expression with the leftmost member being a temporary variable:<?php
$e = NULL;
stream_select($r, $w, $e, 0);
?>
Note:
Be sure to use the
===
operator when checking for an error. Since the stream_select() may return 0 the comparison with==
would evaluate totrue
:<?php
$e = NULL;
if (false === stream_select($r, $w, $e, 0)) {
echo "stream_select() failed\n";
}
?>
Note:
If you read/write to a stream returned in the arrays be aware that they do not necessarily read/write the full amount of data you have requested. Be prepared to even only be able to read/write a single byte.
Note:
Some streams (like
zlib
) cannot be selected by this function.
Note: Windows compatibility
Use of stream_select() on file descriptors returned by proc_open() will fail and return
false
under Windows.
STDIN
from a console changes status as soon as any input events are available, but reading from the stream may still block.