% LAMP - PHP
PHP is ready to use in siduction after installation with the default configuration.
Debian has fully integrated the files of PHP into the file system according to their function:
- the executable program
php7.xand the linkphpinto/usr/bin/- (The latter points to
/usr/bin/php7.xvia/etc/alternatives/php.)
- (The latter points to
- the installed modules into
/usr/lib/php/ - shared program parts and modules into
/usr/share/php/and/usr/share/php<module> - the configuration directories and files into
/etc/php/ - the current state of modules and sessions at runtime into
/var/lib/php/
By default, the Apache web server loads support for PHP. We check this with the following command (replace the "x" with the minor attribute of the currently used PHP version, i.e. something like 7.4):
# ls /etc/apache2/mods-enabled/* | grep php
/etc/apache2/mods-enabled/php7.x.conf
/etc/apache2/mods-enabled/php7.x.load
We see that Apache has loaded the PHP module for version 7.x. To cause the PHP interpreter to process files with the extension ".php", the DirectoryIndex directive in the Apache configuration file dir.conf must contain the value index.php. We check this as well:
# cat /etc/apache2/mods-available/dir.conf
<IfModule mod_dir.c>
DirectoryIndex index.html index.cgi index.pl index.php index.xhtml index.htm
</IfModule>
Nothing stands in the way of using PHP, because the value "index.php" is included.
The directory /etc/php/7.x/ contains the configuration sorted by the available interfaces.
The output shows the state after the initial installation.
# ls -l /etc/php/7.x/
total 20
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 18 Dec 16:54 apache2
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 18 Dec 16:54 cli
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 18 Dec 16:54 mods-available
With the modules "php7.x-cgi" and "php7.x-fpm" installed below, two new directories have been added.
# ls -l /etc/php/7.x/
total 20
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 18 Dec 16:54 apache2
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 1 Feb 21:23 cgi
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 18 Dec 16:54 cli
drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 4096 1 Feb 21:23 fpm
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 1 Feb 13:22 mods-available
Each of the apache2, cgi, cli, and fpm directories contains a conf.d folder and a php.ini file.
The respective "php.ini" contains the configuration for the corresponding interface and can be changed or supplemented if necessary. The "conf.d" folder contains the links to the activated modules.
Queries
A large number of modules are available for PHP. You can find out which ones are already installed with
# dpkg-query -f='${Status}\ ${Package}\n' -W php7.4* | grep '^install'
install ok installed php7.4
install ok installed php7.4-bz2
install ok installed php7.4-cli
install ok installed php7.4-common
install ok installed php7.4-curl
install ok installed php7.4-gd
install ok installed php7.4-imagick
install ok installed php7.4-json
install ok installed php7.4-mbstring
install ok installed php7.4-mysql
install ok installed php7.4-opcache
install ok installed php7.4-readline
install ok installed php7.4-xml
install ok installed php7.4-zip
To show available but not installed modules, we change the end of the command a bit:
# dpkg-query -f='${Status}\ ${Package}\n' -W php7.4* | grep 'not-install'
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-calendar
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-cgi
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-ctype
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-dom
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-exif
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-ffi
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-fileinfo
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-fpm
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-ftp
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-gettext
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-iconv
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-pdo
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-pdo-mysql
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-phar
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-posix
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-shmop
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-simplexml
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-sockets
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-sysvmsg
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-sysvsem
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-sysvshm
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-tokenizer
unknown ok not-installed php7.4-xsl
Now we know the exact names of the modules.
Info
More detailed descriptions of the modules are provided by the command
# apt show <module_name>
Installation
To install modules we use e.g.:
# apt install php7.x-cgi php7.x-fpm
Both modules support CGI scripts and Fast/CGI requests.
Then we restart Apache:
# systemctl restart apache2.service
Handling
The state of PHP modules can be changed during runtime. This also allows controlling modules in scripts to load them before use and unload them afterwards.
phpenmod- activates modules in PHPphpdismod- disables modules in PHPphpquery- shows the status of PHP modules
Unnecessary modules (imagick in the example) are deactivated in the console by the command
# phpdismod imagick
To load the imagick module for all interfaces, use the command
# phpenmod imagick
If we use the option -s apache2, e.g.:
# phpenmod -s apache2 imagick
the module will be loaded for Apache2 only.
The status query with phpquery always requires the module version and interface to be specified. Here are some examples:
# phpquery -v 7.4 -s apache2 -m zip
zip (Enabled for apache2 by maintainer script)
# phpquery -v 7.4 -s cli -m zip
zip (Enabled for cli by maintainer script)
# phpquery -v 7.4 -s fpm -m zip
zip (Enabled for fpm by maintainer script)
# phpquery -v 7.4 -s apache2 -m imagick
imagick (Enabled for apache2 by local administrator)
For the imagick module, the string "Enabled for apache2 by local administrator" tells us that it was not loaded automatically at startup like the zip module, but that the administrator has enabled it manually. The reason is the previously used phpdismod and phpenmod commands for this module.
The Apache server stores the error messages of PHP in its log files under /var/log/apache2/. At the same time, if PHP functions fail, a message appears on the called web page.
Alternatively, we can display the log functions.
# php --info | grep log
[...]
error_log => no value
log_errors => On
log_errors_max_len => 1024
mail.log => no value
opcache.error_log => no value
[...]
In the files /etc/php/7.x/<Interface>/php.ini, we have the possibility to replace the unset values with our own, actually existing log files.
PHP - manual
PHP - current messages
tecadmin - module handling