3 :keywords: xml, rpc, xmlrpc, webservices, http
6 :source-highlighter: highlightjs
12 XML-RPC is a format devised by link:$$http://www.userland.com/$$[Userland Software] for achieving
13 remote procedure call via XML using HTTP as the transport. XML-RPC has its
14 own web site, link:$$http://www.xmlrpc.com/$$[www.xmlrpc.com]
16 This collection of PHP classes provides a framework for writing
17 XML-RPC clients and servers in PHP.
19 Main goals of the project are ease of use, flexibility and
22 The original author is Edd Dumbill of link:$$http://usefulinc.com/$$[Useful Information Company]. As of the
23 1.0 stable release, the project was opened to wider involvement and moved
24 to link:$$http://phpxmlrpc.sourceforge.net/$$[SourceForge]; later, to link:$$https://github.com/gggeek/phpxmlrpc$$[Github]
26 A list of XML-RPC implementations for other languages such as Perl
27 and Python can be found on the link:$$http://www.xmlrpc.com/$$[www.xmlrpc.com] site.
67 Ernest MacDougal Campbell III
105 Przemyslaw Wroblewski
107 Bruno Zanetti Melotti
111 == System Requirements
113 The library has been designed with goals of scalability and backward
114 compatibility. As such, it supports a wide range of PHP installs. Note
115 that not all features of the lib are available in every
118 The __minimum supported__ PHP version is
121 If you wish to use HTTPS or HTTP 1.1 to communicate with remote
122 servers, you need the "curl" extension compiled into your PHP
125 The "xmlrpc" native extension is not required to be compiled into
126 your PHP installation, but if it is, there will be no interference with
127 the operation of this library.
131 == Files in the distribution
134 the XML-RPC classes. include() this in
135 your PHP files to use the classes.
138 the XML-RPC server class. include() this
139 in addition to xmlrpc.inc to get server functionality
141 lib/xmlrpc_wrappers.php::
142 helper functions to "automagically" convert plain php
143 functions to xmlrpc services and vice versa
145 demo/server/proxy.php::
146 a sample server implementing xmlrpc proxy
149 demo/server/server.php::
150 a sample server hosting various demo functions, as well as a
151 full suite of functions used for interoperability testing. It is
152 used by testsuite.php (see below) for unit testing the library, and
153 is not to be copied literally into your production servers
155 demo/client/client.php, demo/client/agesort.php,
156 demo/client/which.php::
157 client code to exercise some of the functions in server.php,
158 including the interopEchoTests.whichToolkit
161 demo/client/wrap.php::
162 client code to illustrate 'wrapping' of remote methods into
165 demo/client/introspect.php::
166 client code to illustrate usage of introspection capabilities
167 offered by server.php.
169 demo/client/mail.php::
170 client code to illustrate usage of an xmlrpc-to-email gateway
171 using Dave Winer's XML-RPC server at userland.com.
173 demo/client/zopetest.php::
174 example client code that queries an xmlrpc server built in
178 examples of how to construct xmlrpcval types
180 demo/demo1.xml, demo/demo2.xml, demo/demo3.xml::
181 XML-RPC responses captured in a file for testing purposes (you
182 can use these to test the
183 xmlrpcmsg->parseResponse() method).
185 demo/server/discuss.php,
186 demo/client/comment.php::
187 Software used in the PHP chapter of <<jellyfish>> to provide a comment server and allow the
188 attachment of comments to stories from Meerkat's data store.
190 test/testsuite.php, test/parse_args.php::
191 A unit test suite for this software package. If you do
192 development on this software, please consider submitting tests for
196 A (very limited) benchmarking suite for this software package.
197 If you do development on this software, please consider submitting
198 benchmarks for this suite.
200 test/phpunit.php, test/PHPUnit/*.php::
201 An (incomplete) version PEAR's unit test framework for PHP.
202 The complete package can be found at link:$$http://pear.php.net/package/PHPUnit$$[http://pear.php.net/package/PHPUnit]
204 test/verify_compat.php::
205 Script designed to help the user to verify the level of
206 compatibility of the library with the current php install
208 extras/test.pl, extras/test.py::
209 Perl and Python programs to exercise server.php to test that
210 some of the methods work.
212 extras/workspace.testPhpServer.fttb::
213 Frontier scripts to exercise the demo server. Thanks to Dave
214 Winer for permission to include these. See link:$$http://www.xmlrpc.com/discuss/msgReader$853$$[Dave's announcement of these.]
217 A test certificate key for the SSL support, which can be used
218 to generate dummy certificates. It has the passphrase "test."
223 == Known bugs and limitations
225 This started out as a bare framework. Many "nice" bits haven't been
226 put in yet. Specifically, very little type validation or coercion has been
227 put in. PHP being a loosely-typed language, this is going to have to be
228 done explicitly (in other words: you can call a lot of library functions
229 passing them arguments of the wrong type and receive an error message only
230 much further down the code, where it will be difficult to
233 dateTime.iso8601 is supported opaquely. It can't be done natively as
234 the XML-RPC specification explicitly forbids passing of timezone
235 specifiers in ISO8601 format dates. You can, however, use the <<iso8601encode>> and <<iso8601decode>> functions
236 to do the encoding and decoding for you.
238 Very little HTTP response checking is performed (e.g. HTTP redirects
239 are not followed and the Content-Length HTTP header, mandated by the
240 xml-rpc spec, is not validated); cookie support still involves quite a bit
241 of coding on the part of the user.
243 If a specific character set encoding other than US-ASCII, ISO-8859-1
244 or UTF-8 is received in the HTTP header or XML prologue of xml-rpc request
245 or response messages then it will be ignored for the moment, and the
246 content will be parsed as if it had been encoded using the charset defined
247 by <<xmlrpc-defencoding>>
249 Support for receiving from servers version 1 cookies (i.e.
250 conforming to RFC 2965) is quite incomplete, and might cause unforeseen
261 XML-RPC for PHP is offered "as-is" without any warranty or
262 commitment to support. However, informal advice and help is available
263 via the XML-RPC for PHP website and mailing list and from
266 * The __XML-RPC for PHP__ development is hosted
267 on link:$$https://github.com/gggeek/phpxmlrpc$$[github.com/gggeek/phpxmlrpc].
268 Bugs, feature requests and patches can be posted to the link:$$https://github.com/gggeek/phpxmlrpc/issues$$[project's website].
270 * The __PHP XML-RPC interest mailing list__ is
271 run by the author. More details link:$$http://lists.gnomehack.com/mailman/listinfo/phpxmlrpc$$[can be found here].
273 * For more general XML-RPC questions, there is a Yahoo! Groups
274 link:$$http://groups.yahoo.com/group/xml-rpc/$$[XML-RPC mailing list].
276 * The link:$$http://www.xmlrpc.com/discuss$$[XML-RPC.com] discussion
277 group is a useful place to get help with using XML-RPC. This group
278 is also gatewayed into the Yahoo! Groups mailing list.
282 === The Jellyfish Book
284 image::progxmlrpc.s.gif[The Jellyfish Book]
285 Together with Simon St.Laurent and Joe
286 Johnston, Edd Dumbill wrote a book on XML-RPC for O'Reilly and
287 Associates on XML-RPC. It features a rather fetching jellyfish on the
290 Complete details of the book are link:$$http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/progxmlrpc/$$[available from O'Reilly's web site.]
292 Edd is responsible for the chapter on PHP, which includes a worked
293 example of creating a forum server, and hooking it up the O'Reilly's
294 link:$$http://meerkat.oreillynet.com/$$[Meerkat] service in
295 order to allow commenting on news stories from around the Web.
297 If you've benefited from the effort that has been put into writing
298 this software, then please consider buying the book!
303 == Class documentation
309 This is where a lot of the hard work gets done. This class enables
310 the creation and encapsulation of values for XML-RPC.
312 Ensure you've read the XML-RPC spec at link:$$http://www.xmlrpc.com/stories/storyReader$7$$[http://www.xmlrpc.com/stories/storyReader$7]
313 before reading on as it will make things clearer.
315 The xmlrpcval class can store arbitrarily
316 complicated values using the following types: ++i4 int boolean string double dateTime.iso8601 base64 array struct++
317 ++null++. You should refer to the link:$$http://www.xmlrpc.com/spec$$[spec] for more information on
318 what each of these types mean.
324 The type i4 is accepted as a synonym
325 for int when creating xmlrpcval objects. The
326 xml parsing code will always convert i4 to
328 by this implementation as the canonical name for this type.
332 Base 64 encoding is performed transparently to the caller when
333 using this type. Decoding is also transparent. Therefore you ought
334 to consider it as a "binary" data type, for use when you want to
335 pass data that is not 7-bit clean.
339 The php values ++true++ and
340 ++1++ map to ++true++. All other
341 values (including the empty string) are converted to
346 Characters <, >, ', ", &, are encoded using their
347 entity reference as &lt; &gt; &apos; &quot; and
348 &amp; All other characters outside of the ASCII range are
349 encoded using their character reference representation (e.g.
350 &#200 for é). The XML-RPC spec recommends only encoding
351 ++< &++ but this implementation goes further,
352 for reasons explained by link:$$http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-xml#syntax$$[the XML 1.0 recommendation]. In particular, using character reference
353 representation has the advantage of producing XML that is valid
354 independently of the charset encoding assumed.
358 There is no support for encoding ++null++
359 values in the XML-RPC spec, but at least a couple of extensions (and
360 many toolkits) do support it. Before using ++null++
361 values in your messages, make sure that the responding party accepts
362 them, and uses the same encoding convention (see ...).
364 [[xmlrpcval-creation]]
368 The constructor is the normal way to create an
369 xmlrpcval. The constructor can take these
373 xmlrpcval xmlrpcvalnew
374 xmlrpcval string $stringVal xmlrpcvalnew
375 xmlrpcval mixed $scalarVal string$scalartyp xmlrpcvalnew
376 xmlrpcval array $arrayVal string $arraytyp The first constructor creates an empty value, which must be
377 altered using the methods addScalar,
378 addArray or addStruct before
381 The second constructor creates a simple string value.
383 The third constructor is used to create a scalar value. The
384 second parameter must be a name of an XML-RPC type. Valid types are:
385 "++int++", "++boolean++",
386 "++string++", "++double++",
387 "++dateTime.iso8601++", "++base64++" or
395 $myInt = new xmlrpcval(1267, "int");
396 $myString = new xmlrpcval("Hello, World!", "string");
397 $myBool = new xmlrpcval(1, "boolean");
398 $myString2 = new xmlrpcval(1.24, "string"); // note: this will serialize a php float value as xmlrpc string
402 The fourth constructor form can be used to compose complex
403 XML-RPC values. The first argument is either a simple array in the
404 case of an XML-RPC array or an associative
405 array in the case of a struct. The elements of
406 the array __must be xmlrpcval objects themselves__.
408 The second parameter must be either "++array++"
416 $myArray = new xmlrpcval(
418 new xmlrpcval("Tom"),
419 new xmlrpcval("Dick"),
420 new xmlrpcval("Harry")
425 $myStruct = new xmlrpcval(
427 "name" => new xmlrpcval("Tom", "string"),
428 "age" => new xmlrpcval(34, "int"),
429 "address" => new xmlrpcval(
431 "street" => new xmlrpcval("Fifht Ave", "string"),
432 "city" => new xmlrpcval("NY", "string")
440 See the file ++vardemo.php++ in this distribution
443 [[xmlrpcval-methods]]
449 int addScalarstring$stringValintaddScalarmixed$scalarValstring$scalartypIf $val is an empty
450 xmlrpcval this method makes it a scalar
451 value, and sets that value.
453 If $val is already a scalar value, then
454 no more scalars can be added and ++0++ is
457 If $val is an xmlrpcval of type array,
458 the php value $scalarval is added as its last
461 If all went OK, ++1++ is returned, otherwise
466 intaddArrayarray$arrayValThe argument is a simple (numerically indexed) array. The
467 elements of the array __must be xmlrpcval objects themselves__.
469 Turns an empty xmlrpcval into an
470 array with contents as specified by
473 If $val is an xmlrpcval of type array,
474 the elements of $arrayVal are appended to the
477 See the fourth constructor form for more information.
479 If all went OK, ++1++ is returned, otherwise
484 int addStructarray$assocArrayValThe argument is an associative array. The elements of the
485 array __must be xmlrpcval objects themselves__.
487 Turns an empty xmlrpcval into a
488 struct with contents as specified by
491 If $val is an xmlrpcval of type struct,
492 the elements of $arrayVal are merged with the
495 See the fourth constructor form for more information.
497 If all went OK, ++1++ is returned, otherwise
502 string kindOf Returns a string containing "struct", "array" or "scalar"
503 describing the base type of the value. If it returns "undef" it
504 means that the value hasn't been initialised.
508 string serialize Returns a string containing the XML-RPC representation of this
514 mixed scalarVal If $val->kindOf() == "scalar", this
515 method returns the actual PHP-language value of the scalar (base 64
516 decoding is automatically handled here).
520 string scalarTyp If $val->kindOf() == "scalar", this
521 method returns a string denoting the type of the scalar. As
522 mentioned before, ++i4++ is always coerced to
527 xmlrpcval arrayMem int $n If $val->kindOf() == "array", returns
528 the $nth element in the array represented by
529 the value $val. The value returned is an
535 // iterating over values of an array object
536 for ($i = 0; $i < $val->arraySize(); $i++)
538 $v = $val->arrayMem($i);
539 echo "Element $i of the array is of type ".$v->kindOf();
546 int arraySize If $val is an
547 array, returns the number of elements in that
552 xmlrpcval structMem string $memberName If $val->kindOf() == "struct", returns
553 the element called $memberName from the
554 struct represented by the value $val. The
555 value returned is an xmlrpcval object.
559 array structEach Returns the next (key, value) pair from the struct, when
561 $value is an xmlrpcval itself. See also <<structreset>>.
566 // iterating over all values of a struct object
568 while (list($key, $v) = $val->structEach())
570 echo "Element $key of the struct is of type ".$v->kindOf();
579 void structReset Resets the internal pointer for
580 structEach() to the beginning of the struct,
581 where $val is a struct.
585 ===== structMemExists
587 bool structMemExsists string $memberName Returns TRUE or
588 FALSE depending on whether a member of the
589 given name exists in the struct.
595 This class provides a representation for a request to an XML-RPC
596 server. A client sends an xmlrpcmsg to a server,
597 and receives back an xmlrpcresp (see <<xmlrpc-client-send>>).
601 The constructor takes the following forms:
604 xmlrpcmsgstring$methodNamearray$parameterArraynullWhere methodName is a string indicating
605 the name of the method you wish to invoke, and
606 parameterArray is a simple php
608 objects. Here's an example message to the __US state name__ server:
613 $msg = new xmlrpcmsg("examples.getStateName", array(new xmlrpcval(23, "int")));
617 This example requests the name of state number 23. For more
618 information on xmlrpcval objects, see <<xmlrpcval>>.
620 Note that the parameterArray parameter is
621 optional and can be omitted for methods that take no input parameters
622 or if you plan to add parameters one by one.
629 bool addParam xmlrpcval $xmlrpcVal Adds the xmlrpcval
630 xmlrpcVal to the parameter list for this
631 method call. Returns TRUE or FALSE on error.
635 int getNumParams Returns the number of parameters attached to this
640 xmlrpcval getParam int $n Gets the nth parameter in the message
641 (with the index zero-based). Use this method in server
642 implementations to retrieve the values sent by the client.
646 string method string method string $methNameGets or sets the method contained in the XML-RPC
651 xmlrpcresp parseResponsestring $xmlString Given an incoming XML-RPC server response contained in the
652 string $xmlString, this method constructs an
653 xmlrpcresp response object and returns it,
654 setting error codes as appropriate (see <<xmlrpc-client-send>>).
656 This method processes any HTTP/MIME headers it finds.
658 ===== parseResponseFile
660 xmlrpcresp parseResponseFile file handle
661 resource$fileHandleGiven an incoming XML-RPC server response on the open file
662 handle fileHandle, this method reads all the
663 data it finds and passes it to
666 This method is useful to construct responses from pre-prepared
667 files (see files ++demo1.xml, demo2.xml, demo3.xml++
668 in this distribution). It processes any HTTP headers it finds, and
669 does not close the file handle.
674 serializeReturns the an XML string representing the XML-RPC
681 This is the basic class used to represent a client of an XML-RPC
686 The constructor accepts one of two possible syntaxes:
689 xmlrpc_clientstring$server_urlxmlrpc_clientnew
690 xmlrpc_clientstring$server_pathstring$server_hostnameint$server_port80string$transport'http'Here are a couple of usage examples of the first form:
696 $client = new xmlrpc_client("http://phpxmlrpc.sourceforge.net/server.php");
697 $another_client = new xmlrpc_client("https://james:bond@secret.service.com:443/xmlrpcserver?agent=007");
701 The second syntax does not allow to express a username and
702 password to be used for basic HTTP authorization as in the second
703 example above, but instead it allows to choose whether xmlrpc calls
704 will be made using the HTTP 1.0 or 1.1 protocol.
706 Here's another example client set up to query Userland's XML-RPC
707 server at __betty.userland.com__:
712 $client = new xmlrpc_client("/RPC2", "betty.userland.com", 80);
716 The server_port parameter is optional,
717 and if omitted will default to 80 when using HTTP and 443 when using
718 HTTPS (see the <<xmlrpc-client-send>> method
721 The transport parameter is optional, and
722 if omitted will default to 'http'. Allowed values are either
724 'http11'. Its value can be overridden with every call
725 to the send method. See the
726 send method below for more details about the
727 meaning of the different values.
732 This class supports the following methods.
734 [[xmlrpc-client-send]]
738 This method takes the forms:
740 xmlrpcresp send xmlrpcmsg $xmlrpc_message int $timeout string $transport array sendarray $xmlrpc_messages int $timeout string $transportxmlrpcrespsendstring$xml_payloadint$timeoutstring$transportWhere xmlrpc_message is an instance of
741 xmlrpcmsg (see <<xmlrpcmsg>>),
742 and response is an instance of
743 xmlrpcresp (see <<xmlrpcresp>>).
745 If xmlrpc_messages is an array of
746 message instances, ++responses++ will be an array of
747 response instances. The client will try to make use of a single
748 ++system.multicall++ xml-rpc method call to forward to the
749 server all the messages in a single HTTP round trip, unless
750 ++$$$client->no_multicall$$++ has been previously set to
751 ++TRUE++ (see the multicall method below), in which case
752 many consecutive xmlrpc requests will be sent.
754 The third syntax allows to build by hand (or any other means)
755 a complete xmlrpc request message, and send it to the server.
756 xml_payload should be a string containing the
757 complete xml representation of the request. It is e.g. useful when,
758 for maximal speed of execution, the request is serialized into a
759 string using the native php xmlrpc functions (see link:$$http://www.php.net/xmlrpc$$[the php manual on xmlrpc]).
761 The timeout is optional, and will be
762 set to ++0++ (wait for platform-specific predefined
763 timeout) if omitted. This timeout value is passed to
764 fsockopen(). It is also used for detecting
765 server timeouts during communication (i.e. if the server does not
766 send anything to the client for timeout
767 seconds, the connection will be closed).
769 The transport parameter is optional,
770 and if omitted will default to the transport set using instance
771 creator or 'http' if omitted. The only other valid values are
772 'https', which will use an SSL HTTP connection to connect to the
773 remote server, and 'http11'. Note that your PHP must have the "curl"
774 extension compiled in order to use both these features. Note that
775 when using SSL you should normally set your port number to 443,
776 unless the SSL server you are contacting runs at any other
779 In addition to low-level errors, the XML-RPC server you were
780 querying may return an error in the
781 xmlrpcresp object. See <<xmlrpcresp>> for details of how to handle these
788 This method takes the form:
790 array multiCall array $messages int $timeout string $transport bool $fallback This method is used to boxcar many method calls in a single
791 xml-rpc request. It will try first to make use of the
792 ++system.multicall++ xml-rpc method call, and fall back to
793 executing many separate requests if the server returns any
797 xmlrpcmsg objects (see <<xmlrpcmsg>>), and response is an
798 array of xmlrpcresp objects (see <<xmlrpcresp>>).
801 transport parameters are optional, and behave
802 as in the send method above.
804 The fallback parameter is optional, and
805 defaults to TRUE. When set to
806 FALSE it will prevent the client to try using
807 many single method calls in case of failure of the first multicall
808 request. It should be set only when the server is known to support
809 the multicall extension.
811 ===== setAcceptedCompression
813 void setAcceptedCompression string $compressionmethod This method defines whether the client will accept compressed
814 xml payload forming the bodies of the xmlrpc responses received from
815 servers. Note that enabling reception of compressed responses merely
816 adds some standard http headers to xmlrpc requests. It is up to the
817 xmlrpc server to return compressed responses when receiving such
818 requests. Allowed values for
819 compressionmethod are: 'gzip', 'deflate',
820 'any' or null (with any meaning either gzip or deflate).
822 This requires the "zlib" extension to be enabled in your php
823 install. If it is, by default xmlrpc_client
824 instances will enable reception of compressed content.
826 ===== setCaCertificate
828 voidsetCaCertificatestring$certificatebool$is_dirThis method sets an optional certificate to be used in
829 SSL-enabled communication to validate a remote server with (when the
830 server_method is set to 'https' in the
831 client's construction or in the send method and
832 SetSSLVerifypeer has been set to
835 The certificate parameter must be the
836 filename of a PEM formatted certificate, or a directory containing
837 multiple certificate files. The is_dir
838 parameter defaults to FALSE, set it to
840 certificate indicates a directory instead of
843 This requires the "curl" extension to be compiled into your
844 installation of PHP. For more details see the man page for the
845 curl_setopt function.
850 voidsetCertificatestring$certificatestring$passphraseThis method sets the optional certificate and passphrase used
851 in SSL-enabled communication with a remote server (when the
852 server_method is set to 'https' in the
853 client's construction or in the send method).
855 The certificate parameter must be the
856 filename of a PEM formatted certificate. The
857 passphrase parameter must contain the
858 password required to use the certificate.
860 This requires the "curl" extension to be compiled into your
861 installation of PHP. For more details see the man page for the
862 curl_setopt function.
864 Note: to retrieve information about the client certificate on
865 the server side, you will need to look into the environment
866 variables which are set up by the webserver. Different webservers
867 will typically set up different variables.
871 void setCookiestring $name string $value string $path string $domain int $portThis method sets a cookie that will be sent to the xmlrpc
872 server along with every further request (useful e.g. for keeping
873 session info outside of the xml-rpc payload).
875 $value is optional, and defaults to
878 $path, $domain and $port are optional,
879 and will be omitted from the cookie header if unspecified. Note that
880 setting any of these values will turn the cookie into a 'version 1'
881 cookie, that might not be fully supported by the server (see RFC2965
886 voidsetCredentialsstring$usernamestring$passwordint$authtypeThis method sets the username and password for authorizing the
887 client to a server. With the default (HTTP) transport, this
888 information is used for HTTP Basic authorization. Note that username
889 and password can also be set using the class constructor. With HTTP
890 1.1 and HTTPS transport, NTLM and Digest authentication protocols
891 are also supported. To enable them use the constants
893 CURLAUTH_NTLM as values for the authtype
899 voidsetCurlOptionsarray$optionsThis method allows to directly set any desired
900 option to manipulate the usage of the cURL client (when in cURL
901 mode). It can be used eg. to explicitly bind to an outgoing ip
902 address when the server is multihomed
907 void setDebugint$debugLvldebugLvl is either ++0, 1++ or 2 depending on whether you require the client to
908 print debugging information to the browser. The default is not to
909 output this information (0).
911 The debugging information at level 1includes the raw data
912 returned from the XML-RPC server it was querying (including bot HTTP
913 headers and the full XML payload), and the PHP value the client
914 attempts to create to represent the value returned by the server. At
915 level2, the complete payload of the xmlrpc request is also printed,
916 before being sent t the server.
918 This option can be very useful when debugging servers as it
919 allows you to see exactly what the client sends and the server
925 voidsetKeyint$keyint$keypassThis method sets the optional certificate key and passphrase
926 used in SSL-enabled communication with a remote server (when the
927 transport is set to 'https' in the client's
928 construction or in the send method).
930 This requires the "curl" extension to be compiled into your
931 installation of PHP. For more details see the man page for the
932 curl_setopt function.
937 voidsetProxystring$proxyhostint$proxyportstring$proxyusernamestring$proxypasswordint$authtypeThis method enables calling servers via an HTTP proxy. The
939 proxypassword and authtype
940 parameters are optional. Authtype defaults to
941 CURLAUTH_BASIC (Basic authentication protocol);
942 the only other valid value is the constant
943 CURLAUTH_NTLM, and has effect only when the
944 client uses the HTTP 1.1 protocol.
946 NB: CURL versions before 7.11.10 cannot use a proxy to
947 communicate with https servers.
950 ===== setRequestCompression
952 voidsetRequestCompressionstring$compressionmethodThis method defines whether the xml payload forming the
953 request body will be sent to the server in compressed format, as per
954 the HTTP specification. This is particularly useful for large
955 request parameters and over slow network connections. Allowed values
956 for compressionmethod are: 'gzip', 'deflate',
957 'any' or null (with any meaning either gzip or deflate). Note that
958 there is no automatic fallback mechanism in place for errors due to
959 servers not supporting receiving compressed request bodies, so make
960 sure that the particular server you are querying does accept
961 compressed requests before turning it on.
963 This requires the "zlib" extension to be enabled in your php
967 ===== setSSLVerifyHost
969 voidsetSSLVerifyHostint$iThis method defines whether connections made to XML-RPC
970 backends via HTTPS should verify the remote host's SSL certificate's
971 common name (CN). By default, only the existence of a CN is checked.
973 integer value; 0 to not check the CN at all, 1 to merely check for
974 its existence, and 2 to check that the CN on the certificate matches
975 the hostname that is being connected to.
978 ===== setSSLVerifyPeer
980 voidsetSSLVerifyPeerbool$iThis method defines whether connections made to XML-RPC
981 backends via HTTPS should verify the remote host's SSL certificate,
982 and cause the connection to fail if the cert verification fails.
983 $i should be a boolean
984 value. Default value: TRUE. To specify custom
985 SSL certificates to validate the server with, use the
986 setCaCertificate method.
991 voidUseragentstring$useragentThis method sets a custom user-agent that will be
992 used by the client in the http headers sent with the request. The
993 default value is built using the library name and version
999 NB: direct manipulation of these variables is only recommended
1005 This member variable determines whether the multicall() method
1006 will try to take advantage of the system.multicall xmlrpc method to
1007 dispatch to the server an array of requests in a single http
1008 roundtrip or simply execute many consecutive http calls. Defaults to
1009 FALSE, but it will be enabled automatically on the first failure of
1010 execution of system.multicall.
1013 ===== request_charset_encoding
1015 This is the charset encoding that will be used for serializing
1016 request sent by the client.
1018 If defaults to NULL, which means using US-ASCII and encoding
1019 all characters outside of the ASCII range using their xml character
1020 entity representation (this has the benefit that line end characters
1021 will not be mangled in the transfer, a CR-LF will be preserved as
1022 well as a singe LF).
1024 Valid values are 'US-ASCII', 'UTF-8' and 'ISO-8859-1'
1030 This member variable determines whether the value returned
1031 inside an xmlrpcresp object as results of calls to the send() and
1032 multicall() methods will be an xmlrpcval object, a plain php value
1033 or a raw xml string. Allowed values are 'xmlrpcvals' (the default),
1034 'phpvals' and 'xml'. To allow the user to differentiate between a
1035 correct and a faulty response, fault responses will be returned as
1036 xmlrpcresp objects in any case. Note that the 'phpvals' setting will
1037 yield faster execution times, but some of the information from the
1038 original response will be lost. It will be e.g. impossible to tell
1039 whether a particular php string value was sent by the server as an
1040 xmlrpc string or base64 value.
1048 $client = new xmlrpc_client("phpxmlrpc.sourceforge.net/server.php");
1049 $client->return_type = 'phpvals';
1050 $message = new xmlrpcmsg("examples.getStateName", array(new xmlrpcval(23, "int")));
1051 $resp = $client->send($message);
1052 if ($resp->faultCode()) echo 'KO. Error: '.$resp->faultString(); else echo 'OK: got '.$resp->value();
1056 For more details about usage of the 'xml' value, see Appendix
1063 This class is used to contain responses to XML-RPC requests. A
1064 server method handler will construct an
1065 xmlrpcresp and pass it as a return value. This
1066 same value will be returned by the result of an invocation of the
1068 xmlrpc_client class.
1074 xmlrpcrespxmlrpcval$xmlrpcvalxmlrpcrespnew
1075 xmlrpcresp0int$errcodestring$err_stringThe first syntax is used when execution has happened without
1076 difficulty: $xmlrpcval is an
1077 xmlrpcval value with the result of the method
1078 execution contained in it. Alternatively it can be a string containing
1079 the xml serialization of the single xml-rpc value result of method
1082 The second type of constructor is used in case of failure.
1083 errcode and err_string
1084 are used to provide indication of what has gone wrong. See <<xmlrpc-server>> for more information on passing error
1093 intfaultCodeReturns the integer fault code return from the XML-RPC
1094 response. A zero value indicates success, any other value indicates
1100 stringfaultStringReturns the human readable explanation of the fault indicated
1101 by $resp->faultCode().
1106 xmlrpcvalvalueReturns an xmlrpcval object containing
1107 the return value sent by the server. If the response's
1108 faultCode is non-zero then the value returned
1109 by this method should not be used (it may not even be an
1112 Note: if the xmlrpcresp instance in question has been created
1113 by an xmlrpc_client object whose
1114 return_type was set to 'phpvals', then a plain
1115 php value will be returned instead of an
1116 xmlrpcval object. If the
1117 return_type was set to 'xml', an xml string will
1118 be returned (see the return_type member var above for more
1124 stringserializeReturns an XML string representation of the response (xml
1125 prologue not included).
1131 The implementation of this class has been kept as simple to use as
1132 possible. The constructor for the server basically does all the work.
1133 Here's a minimal example:
1139 function foo ($xmlrpcmsg) {
1141 return new xmlrpcresp($some_xmlrpc_val);
1145 function foobar($xmlrpcmsg) {
1147 return new xmlrpcresp($some_xmlrpc_val);
1151 $s = new xmlrpc_server(
1153 "examples.myFunc1" => array("function" => "foo"),
1154 "examples.myFunc2" => array("function" => "bar::foobar"),
1159 This performs everything you need to do with a server. The single
1160 constructor argument is an associative array from xmlrpc method names to
1161 php function names. The incoming request is parsed and dispatched to the
1162 relevant php function, which is responsible for returning a
1163 xmlrpcresp object, that will be serialized back
1167 ==== Method handler functions
1169 Both php functions and class methods can be registered as xmlrpc
1172 The synopsis of a method handler function is:
1174 xmlrpcresp $resp = function (xmlrpcmsg $msg)
1176 No text should be echoed 'to screen' by the handler function, or
1177 it will break the xml response sent back to the client. This applies
1178 also to error and warning messages that PHP prints to screen unless
1179 the appropriate parameters have been set in the php.in file. Another
1180 way to prevent echoing of errors inside the response and facilitate
1181 debugging is to use the server SetDebug method with debug level 3 (see
1182 ...). Exceptions thrown duting execution of handler functions are
1183 caught by default and a XML-RPC error reponse is generated instead.
1184 This behaviour can be finetuned by usage of the
1185 exception_handling member variable (see
1188 Note that if you implement a method with a name prefixed by
1189 ++system.++ the handler function will be invoked by the
1190 server with two parameters, the first being the server itself and the
1191 second being the xmlrpcmsg object.
1193 The same php function can be registered as handler of multiple
1196 Here is a more detailed example of what the handler function
1203 function foo ($xmlrpcmsg) {
1204 global $xmlrpcerruser; // import user errcode base value
1206 $meth = $xmlrpcmsg->method(); // retrieve method name
1207 $par = $xmlrpcmsg->getParam(0); // retrieve value of first parameter - assumes at least one param received
1208 $val = $par->scalarval(); // decode value of first parameter - assumes it is a scalar value
1213 // this is an error condition
1214 return new xmlrpcresp(0, $xmlrpcerruser+1, // user error 1
1215 "There's a problem, Captain");
1217 // this is a successful value being returned
1218 return new xmlrpcresp(new xmlrpcval("All's fine!", "string"));
1224 See __server.php__ in this distribution for
1225 more examples of how to do this.
1227 Since release 2.0RC3 there is a new, even simpler way of
1228 registering php functions with the server. See section 5.7
1232 ==== The dispatch map
1234 The first argument to the xmlrpc_server
1235 constructor is an array, called the __dispatch map__.
1236 In this array is the information the server needs to service the
1237 XML-RPC methods you define.
1239 The dispatch map takes the form of an associative array of
1240 associative arrays: the outer array has one entry for each method, the
1241 key being the method name. The corresponding value is another
1242 associative array, which can have the following members:
1245 * ++function++ - this
1246 entry is mandatory. It must be either a name of a function in the
1247 global scope which services the XML-RPC method, or an array
1248 containing an instance of an object and a static method name (for
1249 static class methods the 'class::method' syntax is also
1253 * ++signature++ - this
1254 entry is an array containing the possible signatures (see <<signatures>>) for the method. If this entry is present
1255 then the server will check that the correct number and type of
1256 parameters have been sent for this method before dispatching
1260 * ++docstring++ - this
1261 entry is a string containing documentation for the method. The
1262 documentation may contain HTML markup.
1265 * ++$$signature_docs$$++ - this entry can be used
1266 to provide documentation for the single parameters. It must match
1267 in structure the 'signature' member. By default, only the
1268 documenting_xmlrpc_server class in the
1269 extras package will take advantage of this, since the
1270 "system.methodHelp" protocol does not support documenting method
1271 parameters individually.
1274 * ++$$parameters_type$$++ - this entry can be used
1275 when the server is working in 'xmlrpcvals' mode (see ...) to
1276 define one or more entries in the dispatch map as being functions
1277 that follow the 'phpvals' calling convention. The only useful
1278 value is currently the string ++phpvals++.
1280 Look at the __server.php__ example in the
1281 distribution to see what a dispatch map looks like.
1285 ==== Method signatures
1287 A signature is a description of a method's return type and its
1288 parameter types. A method may have more than one signature.
1290 Within a server's dispatch map, each method has an array of
1291 possible signatures. Each signature is an array of types. The first
1292 entry is the return type. For instance, the method
1295 string examples.getStateName(int)
1302 array($xmlrpcString, $xmlrpcInt)
1306 and, assuming that it is the only possible signature for the
1307 method, it might be used like this in server creation:
1311 $findstate_sig = array(array($xmlrpcString, $xmlrpcInt));
1313 $findstate_doc = 'When passed an integer between 1 and 51 returns the
1314 name of a US state, where the integer is the index of that state name
1315 in an alphabetic order.';
1317 $s = new xmlrpc_server( array(
1318 "examples.getStateName" => array(
1319 "function" => "findstate",
1320 "signature" => $findstate_sig,
1321 "docstring" => $findstate_doc
1328 Note that method signatures do not allow to check nested
1329 parameters, e.g. the number, names and types of the members of a
1330 struct param cannot be validated.
1332 If a method that you want to expose has a definite number of
1333 parameters, but each of those parameters could reasonably be of
1334 multiple types, the array of acceptable signatures will easily grow
1335 into a combinatorial explosion. To avoid such a situation, the lib
1336 defines the global var $xmlrpcValue, which can be
1337 used in method signatures as a placeholder for 'any xmlrpc
1344 $echoback_sig = array(array($xmlrpcValue, $xmlrpcValue));
1346 $findstate_doc = 'Echoes back to the client the received value, regardless of its type';
1348 $s = new xmlrpc_server( array(
1349 "echoBack" => array(
1350 "function" => "echoback",
1351 "signature" => $echoback_sig, // this sig guarantees that the method handler will be called with one and only one parameter
1352 "docstring" => $echoback_doc
1357 Methods system.listMethods,
1359 system.methodSignature and
1360 system.multicall are already defined by the
1361 server, and should not be reimplemented (see Reserved Methods
1365 ==== Delaying the server response
1367 You may want to construct the server, but for some reason not
1368 fulfill the request immediately (security verification, for instance).
1369 If you omit to pass to the constructor the dispatch map or pass it a
1370 second argument of ++0++ this will have the desired
1371 effect. You can then use the service() method of
1372 the server class to service the request. For example:
1378 $s = new xmlrpc_server($myDispMap, 0); // second parameter = 0 prevents automatic servicing of request
1380 // ... some code that does other stuff here
1386 Note that the service method will print
1387 the complete result payload to screen and send appropriate HTTP
1388 headers back to the client, but also return the response object. This
1389 permits further manipulation of the response, possibly in combination
1390 with output buffering.
1392 To prevent the server from sending HTTP headers back to the
1393 client, you can pass a second parameter with a value of
1394 ++TRUE++ to the service
1395 method. In this case, the response payload will be returned instead of
1396 the response object.
1398 Xmlrpc requests retrieved by other means than HTTP POST bodies
1399 can also be processed. For example:
1405 $s = new xmlrpc_server(); // not passing a dispatch map prevents automatic servicing of request
1407 // ... some code that does other stuff here, including setting dispatch map into server object
1409 $resp = $s->service($xmlrpc_request_body, true); // parse a variable instead of POST body, retrieve response payload
1411 // ... some code that does other stuff with xml response $resp here
1416 ==== Modifying the server behaviour
1418 A couple of methods / class variables are available to modify
1419 the behaviour of the server. The only way to take advantage of their
1420 existence is by usage of a delayed server response (see above)
1425 This function controls weather the server is going to echo
1426 debugging messages back to the client as comments in response body.
1427 Valid values: 0,1,2,3, with 1 being the default. At level 0, no
1428 debug info is returned to the client. At level 2, the complete
1429 client request is added to the response, as part of the xml
1430 comments. At level 3, a new PHP error handler is set when executing
1431 user functions exposed as server methods, and all non-fatal errors
1432 are trapped and added as comments into the response.
1435 ===== allow_system_funcs
1437 Default_value: TRUE. When set to FALSE, disables support for
1438 System.xxx functions in the server. It
1439 might be useful e.g. if you do not wish the server to respond to
1440 requests to System.ListMethods.
1443 ===== compress_response
1445 When set to TRUE, enables the server to take advantage of HTTP
1446 compression, otherwise disables it. Responses will be transparently
1447 compressed, but only when an xmlrpc-client declares its support for
1448 compression in the HTTP headers of the request.
1450 Note that the ZLIB php extension must be installed for this to
1451 work. If it is, compress_response will default to
1455 ===== exception_handling
1457 This variable controls the behaviour of the server when an
1458 exception is thrown by a method handler php function. Valid values:
1459 0,1,2, with 0 being the default. At level 0, the server catches the
1460 exception and return an 'internal error' xmlrpc response; at 1 it
1461 catches the exceptions and return an xmlrpc response with the error
1462 code and error message corresponding to the exception that was
1463 thron; at 2 = the exception is floated to the upper layers in the
1467 ===== response_charset_encoding
1469 Charset encoding to be used for response (only affects string
1472 If it can, the server will convert the generated response from
1473 internal_encoding to the intended one.
1475 Valid values are: a supported xml encoding (only UTF-8 and
1476 ISO-8859-1 at present, unless mbstring is enabled), null (leave
1477 charset unspecified in response and convert output stream to
1478 US_ASCII), 'default' (use xmlrpc library default as specified in
1479 xmlrpc.inc, convert output stream if needed), or 'auto' (use
1480 client-specified charset encoding or same as request if request
1481 headers do not specify it (unless request is US-ASCII: then use
1482 library default anyway).
1485 ==== Fault reporting
1487 Fault codes for your servers should start at the value indicated
1488 by the global ++$xmlrpcerruser++ + 1.
1490 Standard errors returned by the server include:
1492 ++1++ Unknown method:: Returned if the server was asked to dispatch a method it
1495 ++2++ Invalid return payload:: This error is actually generated by the client, not
1496 server, code, but signifies that a server returned something it
1497 couldn't understand. A more detailed error report is sometimes
1498 added onto the end of the phrase above.
1500 ++3++ Incorrect parameters:: This error is generated when the server has signature(s)
1501 defined for a method, and the parameters passed by the client do
1502 not match any of signatures.
1504 ++4++ Can't introspect: method unknown:: This error is generated by the builtin
1505 system.* methods when any kind of
1506 introspection is attempted on a method undefined by the
1509 ++5++ Didn't receive 200 OK from remote server:: This error is generated by the client when a remote server
1510 doesn't return HTTP/1.1 200 OK in response to a request. A more
1511 detailed error report is added onto the end of the phrase
1514 ++6++ No data received from server:: This error is generated by the client when a remote server
1515 returns HTTP/1.1 200 OK in response to a request, but no
1516 response body follows the HTTP headers.
1518 ++7++ No SSL support compiled in:: This error is generated by the client when trying to send
1519 a request with HTTPS and the CURL extension is not available to
1522 ++8++ CURL error:: This error is generated by the client when trying to send
1523 a request with HTTPS and the HTTPS communication fails.
1525 ++9-14++ multicall errors:: These errors are generated by the server when something
1526 fails inside a system.multicall request.
1528 ++100-++ XML parse errors:: Returns 100 plus the XML parser error code for the fault
1529 that occurred. The faultString returned
1530 explains where the parse error was in the incoming XML
1534 ==== 'New style' servers
1536 In the same spirit of simplification that inspired the
1537 xmlrpc_client::return_type class variable, a new
1538 class variable has been added to the server class:
1539 functions_parameters_type. When set to 'phpvals',
1540 the functions registered in the server dispatch map will be called
1541 with plain php values as parameters, instead of a single xmlrpcmsg
1542 instance parameter. The return value of those functions is expected to
1543 be a plain php value, too. An example is worth a thousand
1548 function foo($usr_id, $out_lang='en') {
1549 global $xmlrpcerruser;
1553 if ($someErrorCondition)
1554 return new xmlrpcresp(0, $xmlrpcerruser+1, 'DOH!');
1559 'picture' => new xmlrpcval(file_get_contents($picOfTheGuy), 'base64')
1563 $s = new xmlrpc_server(
1565 "examples.myFunc" => array(
1566 "function" => "bar::foobar",
1567 "signature" => array(
1568 array($xmlrpcString, $xmlrpcInt),
1569 array($xmlrpcString, $xmlrpcInt, $xmlrpcString)
1573 $s->functions_parameters_type = 'phpvals';
1578 There are a few things to keep in mind when using this
1581 to return an xmlrpc error, the method handler function must
1582 return an instance of xmlrpcresp. The only
1583 other way for the server to know when an error response should be
1584 served to the client is to throw an exception and set the server's
1585 exception_handling memeber var to 1;
1587 to return a base64 value, the method handler function must
1588 encode it on its own, creating an instance of an xmlrpcval
1591 the method handler function cannot determine the name of the
1592 xmlrpc method it is serving, unlike standard handler functions that
1593 can retrieve it from the message object;
1595 when receiving nested parameters, the method handler function
1596 has no way to distinguish a php string that was sent as base64 value
1597 from one that was sent as a string value;
1599 this has a direct consequence on the support of
1600 system.multicall: a method whose signature contains datetime or base64
1601 values will not be available to multicall calls;
1603 last but not least, the direct parsing of xml to php values is
1604 much faster than using xmlrpcvals, and allows the library to handle
1605 much bigger messages without allocating all available server memory or
1606 smashing PHP recursive call stack.
1613 Many global variables are defined in the xmlrpc.inc file. Some of
1614 those are meant to be used as constants (and modifying their value might
1615 cause unpredictable behaviour), while some others can be modified in your
1616 php scripts to alter the behaviour of the xml-rpc client and
1620 === "Constant" variables
1625 $xmlrpcerruser800The minimum value for errors reported by user
1626 implemented XML-RPC servers. Error numbers lower than that are
1627 reserved for library usage.
1630 ==== $xmlrpcI4, $xmlrpcInt, $xmlrpcBoolean, $xmlrpcDouble, $xmlrpcString, $xmlrpcDateTime, $xmlrpcBase64, $xmlrpcArray, $xmlrpcStruct, $xmlrpcValue, $xmlrpcNull
1632 For convenience the strings representing the XML-RPC types have
1633 been encoded as global variables:
1639 $xmlrpcBoolean="boolean";
1640 $xmlrpcDouble="double";
1641 $xmlrpcString="string";
1642 $xmlrpcDateTime="dateTime.iso8601";
1643 $xmlrpcBase64="base64";
1644 $xmlrpcArray="array";
1645 $xmlrpcStruct="struct";
1646 $xmlrpcValue="undefined";
1651 ==== $xmlrpcTypes, $xmlrpc_valid_parents, $xmlrpcerr, $xmlrpcstr, $xmlrpcerrxml, $xmlrpc_backslash, $_xh, $xml_iso88591_Entities, $xmlEntities, $xmlrpcs_capabilities
1653 Reserved for internal usage.
1656 === Variables whose value can be modified
1658 [[xmlrpc-defencoding]]
1660 ==== xmlrpc_defencoding
1662 $xmlrpc_defencoding"UTF8"This variable defines the character set encoding that will be
1663 used by the xml-rpc client and server to decode the received messages,
1664 when a specific charset declaration is not found (in the messages sent
1665 non-ascii chars are always encoded using character references, so that
1666 the produced xml is valid regardless of the charset encoding
1669 Allowed values: ++"UTF8"++,
1670 ++"ISO-8859-1"++, ++"ASCII".++
1672 Note that the appropriate RFC actually mandates that XML
1673 received over HTTP without indication of charset encoding be treated
1674 as US-ASCII, but many servers and clients 'in the wild' violate the
1675 standard, and assume the default encoding is UTF-8.
1678 ==== xmlrpc_internalencoding
1680 $xmlrpc_internalencoding"ISO-8859-1"This variable defines the character set encoding
1681 that the library uses to transparently encode into valid XML the
1682 xml-rpc values created by the user and to re-encode the received
1683 xml-rpc values when it passes them to the PHP application. It only
1684 affects xml-rpc values of string type. It is a separate value from
1685 xmlrpc_defencoding, allowing e.g. to send/receive xml messages encoded
1686 on-the-wire in US-ASCII and process them as UTF-8. It defaults to the
1687 character set used internally by PHP (unless you are running an
1688 MBString-enabled installation), so you should change it only in
1689 special situations, if e.g. the string values exchanged in the xml-rpc
1690 messages are directly inserted into / fetched from a database
1691 configured to return UTF8 encoded strings to PHP. Example
1699 include('xmlrpc.inc');
1700 $xmlrpc_internalencoding = 'UTF-8'; // this has to be set after the inclusion above
1701 $v = new xmlrpcval('κόÏ
\83με'); // This xmlrpc value will be correctly serialized as the greek word 'kosme'
1707 $xmlrpcName"XML-RPC for PHP"The string representation of the name of the XML-RPC
1708 for PHP library. It is used by the client for building the User-Agent
1709 HTTP header that is sent with every request to the server. You can
1710 change its value if you need to customize the User-Agent
1716 $xmlrpcVersion"2.2"The string representation of the version number of
1717 the XML-RPC for PHP library in use. It is used by the client for
1718 building the User-Agent HTTP header that is sent with every request to
1719 the server. You can change its value if you need to customize the
1723 ==== xmlrpc_null_extension
1725 When set to TRUE, the lib will enable
1726 support for the <NIL/> (and <EX:NIL/>) xmlrpc value, as
1727 per the extension to the standard proposed here. This means that
1728 <NIL/> and <EX:NIL/> tags received will be parsed as valid
1729 xmlrpc, and the corresponding xmlrpcvals will return "null" for
1733 ==== xmlrpc_null_apache_encoding
1735 When set to ++TRUE++, php NULL values encoded
1736 into xmlrpcval objects get serialized using the
1737 ++<EX:NIL/>++ tag instead of
1738 ++<NIL/>++. Please note that both forms are
1739 always accepted as input regardless of the value of this
1747 XML-RPC for PHP contains some helper functions which you can use to
1748 make processing of XML-RPC requests easier.
1753 The XML-RPC specification has this to say on dates:
1757 [[wrap_xmlrpc_method]]
1758 Don't assume a timezone. It should be
1759 specified by the server in its documentation what assumptions it makes
1764 Unfortunately, this means that date processing isn't
1765 straightforward. Although XML-RPC uses ISO 8601 format dates, it doesn't
1766 use the timezone specifier.
1768 We strongly recommend that in every case where you pass dates in
1769 XML-RPC calls, you use UTC (GMT) as your timezone. Most computer
1770 languages include routines for handling GMT times natively, and you
1771 won't have to translate between timezones.
1773 For more information about dates, see link:$$http://www.uic.edu/year2000/datefmt.html$$[ISO 8601: The Right Format for Dates], which has a handy link to a PDF of the ISO
1774 8601 specification. Note that XML-RPC uses exactly one of the available
1775 representations: CCYYMMDDTHH:MM:SS.
1781 stringiso8601_encodestring$time_tint$utc0Returns an ISO 8601 formatted date generated from the UNIX
1782 timestamp $time_t, as returned by the PHP
1785 The argument $utc can be omitted, in
1786 which case it defaults to ++0++. If it is set to
1787 ++1++, then the function corrects the time passed in
1788 for UTC. Example: if you're in the GMT-6:00 timezone and set
1789 $utc, you will receive a date representation
1790 six hours ahead of your local time.
1792 The included demo program __vardemo.php__
1793 includes a demonstration of this function.
1799 intiso8601_decodestring$isoStringint$utc0Returns a UNIX timestamp from an ISO 8601 encoded time and date
1800 string passed in. If $utc is
1801 ++1++ then $isoString is assumed
1802 to be in the UTC timezone, and thus the result is also UTC: otherwise,
1803 the timezone is assumed to be your local timezone and you receive a
1808 === Easy use with nested PHP values
1810 Dan Libby was kind enough to contribute two helper functions that
1811 make it easier to translate to and from PHP values. This makes it easier
1812 to deal with complex structures. At the moment support is limited to
1813 int, double, string,
1814 array, datetime and struct
1815 datatypes; note also that all PHP arrays are encoded as structs, except
1816 arrays whose keys are integer numbers starting with 0 and incremented by
1819 These functions reside in __xmlrpc.inc__.
1823 ==== php_xmlrpc_decode
1825 mixedphp_xmlrpc_decodexmlrpcval$xmlrpc_valarray$optionsarrayphp_xmlrpc_decodexmlrpcmsg$xmlrpcmsg_valstring$optionsReturns a native PHP value corresponding to the values found in
1826 the xmlrpcval $xmlrpc_val,
1827 translated into PHP types. Base-64 and datetime values are
1828 automatically decoded to strings.
1830 In the second form, returns an array containing the parameters
1832 xmlrpcmsg_val, decoded
1835 The options parameter is optional. If
1836 specified, it must consist of an array of options to be enabled in the
1837 decoding process. At the moment the only valid option are
1839 ++$$dates_as_objects$$++. When the first is set, php
1840 objects that have been converted to xml-rpc structs using the
1841 php_xmlrpc_encode function and a corresponding
1842 encoding option will be converted back into object values instead of
1843 arrays (provided that the class definition is available at
1844 reconstruction time). When the second is set, XML-RPC datetime values
1845 will be converted into native dateTime objects
1848 ____WARNING__:__ please take
1849 extreme care before enabling the decode_php_objs
1850 option: when php objects are rebuilt from the received xml, their
1851 constructor function will be silently invoked. This means that you are
1852 allowing the remote end to trigger execution of uncontrolled PHP code
1853 on your server, opening the door to code injection exploits. Only
1854 enable this option when you have complete trust of the remote
1861 // wrapper to expose an existing php function as xmlrpc method handler
1862 function foo_wrapper($m)
1864 $params = php_xmlrpc_decode($m);
1865 $retval = call_user_func_array('foo', $params);
1866 return new xmlrpcresp(new xmlrpcval($retval)); // foo return value will be serialized as string
1869 $s = new xmlrpc_server(array(
1870 "examples.myFunc1" => array(
1871 "function" => "foo_wrapper",
1879 ==== php_xmlrpc_encode
1881 xmlrpcvalphp_xmlrpc_encodemixed$phpvalarray$optionsReturns an xmlrpcval object populated with the PHP
1882 values in $phpval. Works recursively on arrays
1883 and objects, encoding numerically indexed php arrays into array-type
1884 xmlrpcval objects and non numerically indexed php arrays into
1885 struct-type xmlrpcval objects. Php objects are encoded into
1886 struct-type xmlrpcvals, excepted for php values that are already
1887 instances of the xmlrpcval class or descendants thereof, which will
1888 not be further encoded. Note that there's no support for encoding php
1889 values into base-64 values. Encoding of date-times is optionally
1890 carried on on php strings with the correct format.
1892 The options parameter is optional. If
1893 specified, it must consist of an array of options to be enabled in the
1894 encoding process. At the moment the only valid options are
1895 encode_php_objs, ++$$null_extension$$++
1898 The first will enable the creation of 'particular' xmlrpcval
1899 objects out of php objects, that add a "php_class" xml attribute to
1900 their serialized representation. This attribute allows the function
1901 php_xmlrpc_decode to rebuild the native php objects (provided that the
1902 same class definition exists on both sides of the communication). The
1903 second allows to encode php ++NULL++ values to the
1904 ++<NIL/>++ (or
1905 ++<EX:NIL/>++, see ...) tag. The last encodes any
1906 string that matches the ISO8601 format into an XML-RPC
1913 // the easy way to build a complex xml-rpc struct, showing nested base64 value and datetime values
1914 $val = php_xmlrpc_encode(array(
1915 'first struct_element: an int' => 666,
1916 'second: an array' => array ('apple', 'orange', 'banana'),
1917 'third: a base64 element' => new xmlrpcval('hello world', 'base64'),
1918 'fourth: a datetime' => '20060107T01:53:00'
1919 ), array('auto_dates'));
1923 ==== php_xmlrpc_decode_xml
1925 xmlrpcval | xmlrpcresp |
1926 xmlrpcmsgphp_xmlrpc_decode_xmlstring$xmlarray$optionsDecodes the xml representation of either an xmlrpc request,
1927 response or single value, returning the corresponding php-xmlrpc
1928 object, or ++FALSE++ in case of an error.
1930 The options parameter is optional. If
1931 specified, it must consist of an array of options to be enabled in the
1932 decoding process. At the moment, no option is supported.
1938 $text = '<value><array><data><value>Hello world</value></data></array></value>';
1939 $val = php_xmlrpc_decode_xml($text);
1940 if ($val) echo 'Found a value of type '.$val->kindOf(); else echo 'Found invalid xml';
1944 === Automatic conversion of php functions into xmlrpc methods (and vice versa)
1946 For the extremely lazy coder, helper functions have been added
1947 that allow to convert a php function into an xmlrpc method, and a
1948 remotely exposed xmlrpc method into a local php function - or a set of
1949 methods into a php class. Note that these comes with many caveat.
1952 ==== wrap_xmlrpc_method
1954 stringwrap_xmlrpc_method$client$methodname$extra_optionsstringwrap_xmlrpc_method$client$methodname$signum$timeout$protocol$funcnameGiven an xmlrpc server and a method name, creates a php wrapper
1955 function that will call the remote method and return results using
1956 native php types for both params and results. The generated php
1957 function will return an xmlrpcresp object for failed xmlrpc
1960 The second syntax is deprecated, and is listed here only for
1961 backward compatibility.
1963 The server must support the
1964 system.methodSignature xmlrpc method call for
1965 this function to work.
1967 The client param must be a valid
1968 xmlrpc_client object, previously created with the address of the
1969 target xmlrpc server, and to which the preferred communication options
1972 The optional parameters can be passed as array key,value pairs
1973 in the extra_options param.
1975 The signum optional param has the purpose
1976 of indicating which method signature to use, if the given server
1977 method has multiple signatures (defaults to 0).
1980 protocol optional params are the same as in the
1981 xmlrpc_client::send() method.
1983 If set, the optional new_function_name
1984 parameter indicates which name should be used for the generated
1985 function. In case it is not set the function name will be
1988 If the ++$$return_source$$++ optional parameter is
1989 set, the function will return the php source code to build the wrapper
1990 function, instead of evaluating it (useful to save the code and use it
1991 later as stand-alone xmlrpc client).
1993 If the ++$$encode_php_objs$$++ optional parameter is
1994 set, instances of php objects later passed as parameters to the newly
1995 created function will receive a 'special' treatment that allows the
1996 server to rebuild them as php objects instead of simple arrays. Note
1997 that this entails using a "slightly augmented" version of the xmlrpc
1998 protocol (ie. using element attributes), which might not be understood
1999 by xmlrpc servers implemented using other libraries.
2001 If the ++$$decode_php_objs$$++ optional parameter is
2002 set, instances of php objects that have been appropriately encoded by
2003 the server using a coordinate option will be deserialized as php
2004 objects instead of simple arrays (the same class definition should be
2005 present server side and client side).
2007 __Note that this might pose a security risk__,
2008 since in order to rebuild the object instances their constructor
2009 method has to be invoked, and this means that the remote server can
2010 trigger execution of unforeseen php code on the client: not really a
2011 code injection, but almost. Please enable this option only when you
2012 trust the remote server.
2014 In case of an error during generation of the wrapper function,
2015 FALSE is returned, otherwise the name (or source code) of the new
2018 Known limitations: server must support
2019 system.methodsignature for the wanted xmlrpc
2020 method; for methods that expose multiple signatures, only one can be
2021 picked; for remote calls with nested xmlrpc params, the caller of the
2022 generated php function has to encode on its own the params passed to
2023 the php function if these are structs or arrays whose (sub)members
2024 include values of type base64.
2026 Note: calling the generated php function 'might' be slow: a new
2027 xmlrpc client is created on every invocation and an xmlrpc-connection
2028 opened+closed. An extra 'debug' param is appended to the parameter
2029 list of the generated php function, useful for debugging
2038 $c = new xmlrpc_client('http://phpxmlrpc.sourceforge.net/server.php');
2040 $function = wrap_xmlrpc_method($client, 'examples.getStateName');
2043 die('Cannot introspect remote method');
2046 $statename = $function($a);
2047 if (is_a($statename, 'xmlrpcresp')) // call failed
2049 echo 'Call failed: '.$statename->faultCode().'. Calling again with debug on';
2050 $function($a, true);
2053 echo "OK, state nr. $stateno is $statename";
2058 [[wrap_php_function]]
2060 ==== wrap_php_function
2062 arraywrap_php_functionstring$funcnamestring$wrapper_function_namearray$extra_optionsGiven a user-defined PHP function, create a PHP 'wrapper'
2063 function that can be exposed as xmlrpc method from an xmlrpc_server
2064 object and called from remote clients, and return the appropriate
2065 definition to be added to a server's dispatch map.
2067 The optional $wrapper_function_name
2068 specifies the name that will be used for the auto-generated
2071 Since php is a typeless language, to infer types of input and
2072 output parameters, it relies on parsing the javadoc-style comment
2073 block associated with the given function. Usage of xmlrpc native types
2074 (such as datetime.dateTime.iso8601 and base64) in the docblock @param
2075 tag is also allowed, if you need the php function to receive/send data
2076 in that particular format (note that base64 encoding/decoding is
2077 transparently carried out by the lib, while datetime vals are passed
2080 Known limitations: only works for
2081 user-defined functions, not for PHP internal functions (reflection
2082 does not support retrieving number/type of params for those); the
2083 wrapped php function will not be able to programmatically return an
2084 xmlrpc error response.
2086 If the ++$$return_source$$++ optional parameter is
2087 set, the function will return the php source code to build the wrapper
2088 function, instead of evaluating it (useful to save the code and use it
2089 later in a stand-alone xmlrpc server). It will be in the stored in the
2090 ++source++ member of the returned array.
2092 If the ++$$suppress_warnings$$++ optional parameter
2093 is set, any runtime warning generated while processing the
2094 user-defined php function will be catched and not be printed in the
2095 generated xml response.
2097 If the extra_options array contains the
2098 ++$$encode_php_objs$$++ value, wrapped functions returning
2099 php objects will generate "special" xmlrpc responses: when the xmlrpc
2100 decoding of those responses is carried out by this same lib, using the
2101 appropriate param in php_xmlrpc_decode(), the objects will be
2104 In short: php objects can be serialized, too (except for their
2105 resource members), using this function. Other libs might choke on the
2106 very same xml that will be generated in this case (i.e. it has a
2107 nonstandard attribute on struct element tags)
2109 If the ++$$decode_php_objs$$++ optional parameter is
2110 set, instances of php objects that have been appropriately encoded by
2111 the client using a coordinate option will be deserialized and passed
2112 to the user function as php objects instead of simple arrays (the same
2113 class definition should be present server side and client
2116 __Note that this might pose a security risk__,
2117 since in order to rebuild the object instances their constructor
2118 method has to be invoked, and this means that the remote client can
2119 trigger execution of unforeseen php code on the server: not really a
2120 code injection, but almost. Please enable this option only when you
2121 trust the remote clients.
2129 * State name from state number decoder. NB: do NOT remove this comment block.
2130 * @param integer $stateno the state number
2131 * @return string the name of the state (or error description)
2133 function findstate($stateno)
2136 if (isset($stateNames[$stateno-1]))
2138 return $stateNames[$stateno-1];
2142 return "I don't have a state for the index '" . $stateno . "'";
2146 // wrap php function, build xmlrpc server
2148 $findstate_sig = wrap_php_function('findstate');
2150 $methods['examples.getStateName'] = $findstate_sig;
2151 $srv = new xmlrpc_server($methods);
2157 === Functions removed from the library
2159 The following two functions have been deprecated in version 1.1 of
2160 the library, and removed in version 2, in order to avoid conflicts with
2161 the EPI xml-rpc library, which also defines two functions with the same
2164 To ease the transition to the new naming scheme and avoid breaking
2165 existing implementations, the following scheme has been adopted:
2167 * If EPI-XMLRPC is not active in the current PHP installation,
2168 the constant ++$$XMLRPC_EPI_ENABLED$$++ will be set to
2172 * If EPI-XMLRPC is active in the current PHP installation, the
2173 constant ++$$XMLRPC_EPI_ENABLED$$++ will be set to
2178 The following documentation is kept for historical
2185 mixedx mlrpc_decode xmlrpcval $xmlrpc_val Alias for php_xmlrpc_decode.
2191 xmlrpcval xmlrpc_encode mixed $phpvalAlias for php_xmlrpc_encode.
2197 ==== xmlrpc_debugmsg
2199 void xmlrpc_debugmsgstring$debugstringSends the contents of $debugstring in XML
2200 comments in the server return payload. If a PHP client has debugging
2201 turned on, the user will be able to see server debug
2204 Use this function in your methods so you can pass back
2205 diagnostic information. It is only available from
2213 In order to extend the functionality offered by XML-RPC servers
2214 without impacting on the protocol, reserved methods are supported in this
2217 All methods starting with system. are
2218 considered reserved by the server. PHP for XML-RPC itself provides four
2219 special methods, detailed in this chapter.
2221 Note that all server objects will automatically respond to clients
2222 querying these methods, unless the property
2223 allow_system_funcs has been set to
2224 false before calling the
2225 service() method. This might pose a security risk
2226 if the server is exposed to public access, e.g. on the internet.
2229 === system.getCapabilities
2232 === system.listMethods
2234 This method may be used to enumerate the methods implemented by
2237 The system.listMethods method requires no
2238 parameters. It returns an array of strings, each of which is the name of
2239 a method implemented by the server.
2243 === system.methodSignature
2245 This method takes one parameter, the name of a method implemented
2246 by the XML-RPC server.
2248 It returns an array of possible signatures for this method. A
2249 signature is an array of types. The first of these types is the return
2250 type of the method, the rest are parameters.
2252 Multiple signatures (i.e. overloading) are permitted: this is the
2253 reason that an array of signatures are returned by this method.
2255 Signatures themselves are restricted to the top level parameters
2256 expected by a method. For instance if a method expects one array of
2257 structs as a parameter, and it returns a string, its signature is simply
2258 "string, array". If it expects three integers, its signature is "string,
2261 For parameters that can be of more than one type, the "undefined"
2262 string is supported.
2264 If no signature is defined for the method, a not-array value is
2265 returned. Therefore this is the way to test for a non-signature, if
2266 $resp below is the response object from a method
2267 call to system.methodSignature:
2272 $v = $resp->value();
2273 if ($v->kindOf() != "array") {
2274 // then the method did not have a signature defined
2279 See the __introspect.php__ demo included in this
2280 distribution for an example of using this method.
2284 === system.methodHelp
2286 This method takes one parameter, the name of a method implemented
2287 by the XML-RPC server.
2289 It returns a documentation string describing the use of that
2290 method. If no such string is available, an empty string is
2293 The documentation string may contain HTML markup.
2295 === system.multicall
2297 This method takes one parameter, an array of 'request' struct
2298 types. Each request struct must contain a
2299 methodName member of type string and a
2300 params member of type array, and corresponds to
2301 the invocation of the corresponding method.
2303 It returns a response of type array, with each value of the array
2304 being either an error struct (containing the faultCode and faultString
2305 members) or the successful response value of the corresponding single
2313 The best examples are to be found in the sample files included with
2314 the distribution. Some are included here.
2318 === XML-RPC client: state name query
2320 Code to get the corresponding state name from a number (1-50) from
2321 the demo server available on SourceForge
2326 $m = new xmlrpcmsg('examples.getStateName',
2327 array(new xmlrpcval($HTTP_POST_VARS["stateno"], "int")));
2328 $c = new xmlrpc_client("/server.php", "phpxmlrpc.sourceforge.net", 80);
2330 if (!$r->faultCode()) {
2332 print "State number " . htmlentities($HTTP_POST_VARS["stateno"]) . " is " .
2333 htmlentities($v->scalarval()) . "<BR>";
2334 print "<HR>I got this value back<BR><PRE>" .
2335 htmlentities($r->serialize()) . "</PRE><HR>\n";
2338 print "Code: " . htmlentities($r->faultCode()) . "<BR>" .
2339 "Reason: '" . htmlentities($r->faultString()) . "'<BR>";
2344 === Executing a multicall call
2352 == Frequently Asked Questions
2356 ==== How to send custom XML as payload of a method call::
2358 Unfortunately, at the time the XML-RPC spec was designed, support
2359 for namespaces in XML was not as ubiquitous as it is now. As a
2360 consequence, no support was provided in the protocol for embedding XML
2361 elements from other namespaces into an xmlrpc request.
2363 To send an XML "chunk" as payload of a method call or response,
2364 two options are available: either send the complete XML block as a
2365 string xmlrpc value, or as a base64 value. Since the '<' character in
2366 string values is encoded as '&lt;' in the xml payload of the method
2367 call, the XML string will not break the surrounding xmlrpc, unless
2368 characters outside of the assumed character set are used. The second
2369 method has the added benefits of working independently of the charset
2370 encoding used for the xml to be transmitted, and preserving exactly
2371 whitespace, whilst incurring in some extra message length and cpu load
2372 (for carrying out the base64 encoding/decoding).
2375 ==== Is there any limitation on the size of the requests / responses that can be successfully sent?::
2377 Yes. But I have no hard figure to give; it most likely will depend
2378 on the version of PHP in usage and its configuration.
2380 Keep in mind that this library is not optimized for speed nor for
2381 memory usage. Better alternatives exist when there are strict
2382 requirements on throughput or resource usage, such as the php native
2383 xmlrpc extension (see the PHP manual for more information).
2385 Keep in mind also that HTTP is probably not the best choice in
2386 such a situation, and XML is a deadly enemy. CSV formatted data over
2387 socket would be much more efficient.
2389 If you really need to move a massive amount of data around, and
2390 you are crazy enough to do it using phpxmlrpc, your best bet is to
2391 bypass usage of the xmlrpcval objects, at least in the decoding phase,
2392 and have the server (or client) object return to the calling function
2393 directly php values (see xmlrpc_client::return_type
2394 and xmlrpc_server::functions_parameters_type for more
2398 ==== My server (client) returns an error whenever the client (server) returns accented characters
2403 ==== How to enable long-lasting method calls
2408 ==== My client returns "XML-RPC Fault #2: Invalid return payload: enable debugging to examine incoming payload": what should I do?
2410 The response you are seeing is a default error response that the
2411 client object returns to the php application when the server did not
2412 respond to the call with a valid xmlrpc response.
2414 The most likely cause is that you are not using the correct URL
2415 when creating the client object, or you do not have appropriate access
2416 rights to the web page you are requesting, or some other common http
2419 To find out what the server is really returning to your client,
2420 you have to enable the debug mode of the client, using
2421 $client->setdebug(1);
2424 ==== How can I save to a file the xml of the xmlrpc responses received from servers?
2426 If what you need is to save the responses received from the server
2427 as xml, you have two options:
2429 1- use the serialize() method on the response object.
2435 $resp = $client->send($msg);
2436 if (!$resp->faultCode())
2437 $data_to_be_saved = $resp->serialize();
2441 Note that this will not be 100% accurate, since the xml generated
2442 by the response object can be different from the xml received,
2443 especially if there is some character set conversion involved, or such
2444 (eg. if you receive an empty string tag as <string/>, serialize()
2445 will output <string></string>), or if the server sent back
2446 as response something invalid (in which case the xml generated client
2447 side using serialize() will correspond to the error response generated
2448 internally by the lib).
2450 2 - set the client object to return the raw xml received instead
2451 of the decoded objects:
2457 $client = new xmlrpc_client($url);
2458 $client->return_type = 'xml';
2459 $resp = $client->send($msg);
2460 if (!$resp->faultCode())
2461 $data_to_be_saved = $resp->value();
2465 Note that using this method the xml response response will not be
2466 parsed at all by the library, only the http communication protocol will
2467 be checked. This means that xmlrpc responses sent by the server that
2468 would have generated an error response on the client (eg. malformed xml,
2469 responses that have faultcode set, etc...) now will not be flagged as
2470 invalid, and you might end up saving not valid xml but random
2474 ==== Can I use the ms windows character set?
2476 If the data your application is using comes from a Microsoft
2477 application, there are some chances that the character set used to
2478 encode it is CP1252 (the same might apply to data received from an
2479 external xmlrpc server/client, but it is quite rare to find xmlrpc
2480 toolkits that encode to CP1252 instead of UTF8). It is a character set
2481 which is "almost" compatible with ISO 8859-1, but for a few extra
2484 PHP-XMLRPC only supports the ISO 8859-1 and UTF8 character sets.
2485 The net result of this situation is that those extra characters will not
2486 be properly encoded, and will be received at the other end of the
2487 XML-RPC transmission as "garbled data". Unfortunately the library cannot
2488 provide real support for CP1252 because of limitations in the PHP 4 xml
2489 parser. Luckily, we tried our best to support this character set anyway,
2490 and, since version 2.2.1, there is some form of support, left commented
2493 To properly encode outgoing data that is natively in CP1252, you
2494 will have to uncomment all relative code in the file
2495 __xmlrpc.inc__ (you can search for the string "1252"),
2496 then set ++$$$GLOBALS['xmlrpc_internalencoding']='CP1252';$$++
2497 Please note that all incoming data will then be fed to your application
2498 as UTF-8 to avoid any potential data loss.
2501 ==== Does the library support using cookies / http sessions?
2503 In short: yes, but a little coding is needed to make it
2506 The code below uses sessions to e.g. let the client store a value
2507 on the server and retrieve it later.
2512 $resp = $client->send(new xmlrpcmsg('registervalue', array(new xmlrpcval('foo'), new xmlrpcval('bar'))));
2513 if (!$resp->faultCode())
2515 $cookies = $resp->cookies();
2516 if (array_key_exists('PHPSESSID', $cookies)) // nb: make sure to use the correct session cookie name
2518 $session_id = $cookies['PHPSESSID']['value'];
2520 // do some other stuff here...
2522 $client->setcookie('PHPSESSID', $session_id);
2523 $val = $client->send(new xmlrpcmsg('getvalue', array(new xmlrpcval('foo')));
2529 Server-side sessions are handled normally like in any other
2530 php application. Please see the php manual for more information about
2533 NB: unlike web browsers, not all xmlrpc clients support usage of
2534 http cookies. If you have troubles with sessions and control only the
2535 server side of the communication, please check with the makers of the
2536 xmlrpc client in use.
2542 == Integration with the PHP xmlrpc extension
2544 To be documented more...
2546 In short: for the fastest execution possible, you can enable the php
2547 native xmlrpc extension, and use it in conjunction with phpxmlrpc. The
2548 following code snippet gives an example of such integration
2554 /*** client side ***/
2555 $c = new xmlrpc_client('http://phpxmlrpc.sourceforge.net/server.php');
2557 // tell the client to return raw xml as response value
2558 $c->return_type = 'xml';
2560 // let the native xmlrpc extension take care of encoding request parameters
2561 $r = $c->send(xmlrpc_encode_request('examples.getStateName', $_POST['stateno']));
2563 if ($r->faultCode())
2564 // HTTP transport error
2565 echo 'Got error '.$r->faultCode();
2568 // HTTP request OK, but XML returned from server not parsed yet
2569 $v = xmlrpc_decode($r->value());
2570 // check if we got a valid xmlrpc response from server
2572 echo 'Got invalid response';
2574 // check if server sent a fault response
2575 if (xmlrpc_is_fault($v))
2576 echo 'Got xmlrpc fault '.$v['faultCode'];
2578 echo'Got response: '.htmlentities($v);
2587 == Substitution of the PHP xmlrpc extension
2589 Yet another interesting situation is when you are using a ready-made
2590 php application, that provides support for the XMLRPC protocol via the
2591 native php xmlrpc extension, but the extension is not available on your
2592 php install (e.g. because of shared hosting constraints).
2594 Since version 2.1, the PHP-XMLRPC library provides a compatibility
2595 layer that aims to be 100% compliant with the xmlrpc extension API. This
2596 means that any code written to run on the extension should obtain the
2597 exact same results, albeit using more resources and a longer processing
2598 time, using the PHP-XMLRPC library and the extension compatibility module.
2599 The module is part of the EXTRAS package, available as a separate download
2600 from the sourceforge.net website, since version 0.2
2606 == 'Enough of xmlrpcvals!': new style library usage
2610 In the meantime, see docs about xmlrpc_client::return_type and
2611 xmlrpc_server::functions_parameters_types, as well as php_xmlrpc_encode,
2612 php_xmlrpc_decode and php_xmlrpc_decode_xml
2618 == Usage of the debugger
2620 A webservice debugger is included in the library to help during
2621 development and testing.
2623 The interface should be self-explicative enough to need little
2626 image::debugger.gif[,,,,align="center"]
2628 The most useful feature of the debugger is without doubt the "Show
2629 debug info" option. It allows to have a screen dump of the complete http
2630 communication between client and server, including the http headers as
2631 well as the request and response payloads, and is invaluable when
2632 troubleshooting problems with charset encoding, authentication or http
2635 The debugger can take advantage of the JSONRPC library extension, to
2636 allow debugging of JSON-RPC webservices, and of the JS-XMLRPC library
2637 visual editor to allow easy mouse-driven construction of the payload for
2638 remote methods. Both components have to be downloaded separately from the
2639 sourceforge.net web pages and copied to the debugger directory to enable
2640 the extra functionality:
2643 * to enable jsonrpc functionality, download the PHP-XMLRPC
2644 EXTRAS package, and copy the file __jsonrpc.inc__
2645 either to the same directory as the debugger or somewhere in your
2649 * to enable the visual value editing dialog, download the
2650 JS-XMLRPC library, and copy somewhere in the web root files
2651 __visualeditor.php__,
2652 __visualeditor.css__ and the folders
2653 __yui__ and __img__. Then edit the
2654 debugger file __controller.php__ and set
2655 appropriately the variable $editorpath.
2663 __Note:__ not all items the following list have
2664 (yet) been fully documented, and some might not be present in any other
2665 chapter in the manual. To find a more detailed description of new
2666 functions and methods please take a look at the source code of the
2667 library, which is quite thoroughly commented in phpdoc form.
2671 ...to be documented...
2675 __Note:__ this is the last release of the library that will support PHP 5.1 and up.
2676 Future releases will target php 5.3 as minimum supported version.
2678 * when using curl and keepalive, reset curl handle if we did not get back an http 200 response (eg a 302)
2680 * omit port on http 'Host' header if it is 80
2682 * test suite allows interrogating https servers ignoring their certs
2684 * method setAcceptedCompression was failing to disable reception of compressed responses if the
2685 client supported them
2689 This is the first release of the library to only support PHP 5.
2690 Some legacy code has been removed, and support for features such as
2691 exceptions and dateTime objects introduced.
2693 The "beta" tag is meant to indicate the fact that the refactoring
2694 has been more widespread than in precedent releases and that more
2695 changes are likely to be introduced with time - the library is still
2696 considered to be production quality.
2698 * improved: removed all usage of php functions deprecated in
2699 php 5.3, usage of assign-by-ref when creating new objects
2702 * improved: add support for the <ex:nil/> tag used by
2703 the apache library, both in input and output
2705 * improved: add support for dateTime
2706 objects in both in php_xmlrpc_encode and as
2707 parameter for constructor of
2710 * improved: add support for timestamps as parameter for
2711 constructor of xmlrpcval
2713 * improved: add option 'dates_as_objects' to
2714 php_xmlrpc_decode to return
2715 dateTime objects for xmlrpc
2718 * improved: add new method
2720 xmrlpc_client to allow extra flexibility in
2721 tweaking http config, such as explicitly binding to an ip
2724 * improved: add new method
2726 xmrlpc_client to to allow having different
2727 user-agent http headers
2729 * improved: add a new member variable in server class to allow
2730 fine-tuning of the encoding of returned values when the server is
2733 * improved: allow servers in 'xmlrpcvals' mode to also
2734 register plain php functions by defining them in the dispatch map
2735 with an added option
2737 * improved: catch exceptions thrown during execution of php
2738 functions exposed as methods by the server
2740 * fixed: bad encoding if same object is encoded twice using
2745 __Note:__ this is the last release of the
2746 library that will support PHP 4. Future releases (if any) should target
2747 php 5.0 as minimum supported version.
2749 * fixed: encoding of utf-8 characters outside of the BMP
2752 * fixed: character set declarations surrounded by double
2753 quotes were not recognized in http headers
2755 * fixed: be more tolerant in detection of charset in http
2758 * fixed: fix detection of zlib.output_compression
2760 * fixed: use feof() to test if socket connections are to be
2761 closed instead of the number of bytes read (rare bug when
2762 communicating with some servers)
2764 * fixed: format floating point values using the correct
2765 decimal separator even when php locale is set to one that uses
2768 * fixed: improve robustness of the debugger when parsing weird
2769 results from non-compliant servers
2771 * php warning when receiving 'false' in a bool value
2773 * improved: allow the add_to_map server method to add docs for
2776 * improved: added the possibility to wrap for exposure as
2777 xmlrpc methods plain php class methods, object methods and even
2782 * fixed: work aroung bug in php 5.2.2 which broke support of
2785 * fixed: is_dir parameter of setCaCertificate() method is
2788 * fixed: a php warning in xmlrpc_client creator method
2790 * fixed: parsing of '1e+1' as valid float
2792 * fixed: allow errorlevel 3 to work when prev. error handler was
2795 * fixed: usage of client::setcookie() for multiple cookies in
2798 * improved: support for CP1252 charset is not part or the
2799 library but almost possible
2801 * improved: more info when curl is enabled and debug mode is
2805 * fixed: debugger errors on php installs with magic_quotes_gpc
2808 * fixed: support for https connections via proxy
2810 * fixed: wrap_xmlrpc_method() generated code failed to properly
2813 * improved: slightly faster encoding of data which is internally
2816 * improved: debugger always generates a 'null' id for jsonrpc if
2819 * new: debugger can take advantage of a graphical value builder
2820 (it has to be downloaded separately, as part of jsxmlrpc package.
2821 See Appendix D for more details)
2823 * new: support for the <NIL/> xmlrpc extension. see below
2826 * new: server support for the system.getCapabilities xmlrpc
2829 * new: <<wrap_xmlrpc_method,wrap_xmlrpc_method()>>
2830 accepts two new options: debug and return_on_fault
2834 * The wrap_php_function and
2835 wrap_xmlrpc_method functions have been moved
2836 out of the base library file __xmlrpc.inc__ into
2837 a file of their own: __$$xmlrpc_wrappers.php$$__. You
2838 will have to include() / require() it in your scripts if you have
2839 been using those functions. For increased security, the automatic
2840 rebuilding of php object instances out of received xmlrpc structs
2841 in wrap_xmlrpc_method() has been disabled
2842 (but it can be optionally re-enabled). Both
2843 wrap_php_function() and
2844 wrap_xmlrpc_method() functions accept many
2845 more options to fine tune their behaviour, including one to return
2846 the php code to be saved and later used as standalone php
2849 * The constructor of xmlrpcval() values has seen some internal
2850 changes, and it will not throw a php warning anymore when invoked
2851 using an unknown xmlrpc type: the error will only be written to
2852 php error log. Also ++$$new xmlrpcval('true', 'boolean')$$++
2853 is not supported anymore
2856 php_xmlrpc_decode_xml() will take the xml
2857 representation of either an xmlrpc request, response or single
2858 value and return the corresponding php-xmlrpc object
2861 * A new function wrap_xmlrpc_server()has
2862 been added, to wrap all (or some) of the methods exposed by a
2863 remote xmlrpc server into a php class
2865 * A new file has been added:
2866 __$$verify_compat.php$$__, to help users diagnose the
2867 level of compliance of their php installation with the
2870 * Restored compatibility with php 4.0.5 (for those poor souls
2873 * Method xmlrpc_server->service()
2874 now returns a value: either the response payload or xmlrpcresp
2878 xmlrpc_server->add_to_map() now
2879 accepts xmlrpc methods with no param definitions
2881 * Documentation for single parameters of exposed methods can
2882 be added to the dispatch map (and turned into html docs in
2883 conjunction with a future release of the 'extras' package)
2885 * Full response payload is saved into xmlrpcresp object for
2888 * The debugger can now generate code that wraps a remote
2889 method into a php function (works for jsonrpc, too); it also has
2890 better support for being activated via a single GET call (e.g. for
2891 integration into other tools)
2893 * Stricter parsing of incoming xmlrpc messages: two more
2894 invalid cases are now detected (double ++data++
2895 element inside ++array++ and
2896 ++struct++/++array++ after scalar
2897 inside ++value++ element)
2899 * More logging of errors in a lot of situations
2901 * Javadoc documentation of lib files (almost) complete
2903 * Many performance tweaks and code cleanups, plus the usual
2904 crop of bugs fixed (see NEWS file for complete list of
2907 * Lib internals have been modified to provide better support
2908 for grafting extra functionality on top of it. Stay tuned for
2909 future releases of the EXTRAS package (or go read Appendix
2914 * Added to the client class the possibility to use Digest and
2915 NTLM authentication methods (when using the CURL library) for
2916 connecting to servers and NTLM for connecting to proxies
2918 * Added to the client class the possibility to specify
2919 alternate certificate files/directories for authenticating the
2920 peer with when using HTTPS communication
2922 * Reviewed all examples and added a new demo file, containing
2923 a proxy to forward xmlrpc requests to other servers (useful e.g.
2926 * The debugger has been upgraded to reflect the new client
2929 * All known bugs have been squashed, and the lib is more
2930 tolerant than ever of commonly-found mistakes
2932 === 2.0 Release candidate 3
2934 * Added to server class the property
2935 functions_parameters_type, that allows the
2936 server to register plain php functions as xmlrpc methods (i.e.
2937 functions that do not take an xmlrpcmsg object as unique
2940 * let server and client objects serialize calls using a
2941 specified character set encoding for the produced xml instead of
2942 US-ASCII (ISO-8859-1 and UTF-8 supported)
2944 * let php_xmlrpc_decode accept xmlrpcmsg objects as valid
2947 * 'class::method' syntax is now accepted in the server
2950 * xmlrpc_clent::SetDebug() accepts
2951 integer values instead of a boolean value, with debugging level 2
2952 adding to the information printed to screen the complete client
2955 === 2.0 Release candidate 2
2957 * Added a new property of the client object:
2958 ++$$xmlrpc_client->return_type$$++, indicating whether
2959 calls to the send() method will return xmlrpcresp objects whose
2960 value() is an xmlrpcval object, a php value (automatically
2961 decoded) or the raw xml received from the server.
2963 * Added in the extras dir. two new library file:
2965 __jsonrpcs.inc__ containing new classes that
2966 implement support for the json-rpc protocol (alpha quality
2969 * Added a new client method: ++setKey($key,
2970 $keypass)++ to be used in HTTPS connections
2972 * Added a new file containing some benchmarks in the testsuite
2975 === 2.0 Release candidate 1
2977 * Support for HTTP proxies (new method:
2978 ++$$xmlrpc_client::setProxy()$$++)
2980 * Support HTTP compression of both requests and responses.
2981 Clients can specify what kind of compression they accept for
2982 responses between deflate/gzip/any, and whether to compress the
2983 requests. Servers by default compress responses to clients that
2984 explicitly declare support for compression (new methods:
2985 ++$$xmlrpc_client::setAcceptedCompression()$$++,
2986 ++$$xmlrpc_client::setRequestCompression()$$++). Note that the
2987 ZLIB php extension needs to be enabled in PHP to support
2990 * Implement HTTP 1.1 connections, but only if CURL is enabled
2991 (added an extra parameter to
2992 ++$$xmlrpc_client::xmlrpc_client$$++ to set the desired HTTP
2993 protocol at creation time and a new supported value for the last
2994 parameter of ++$$xmlrpc_client::send$$++, which now can be
2995 safely omitted if it has been specified at creation time)
2997 With PHP versions greater than 4.3.8 keep-alives are enabled
2998 by default for HTTP 1.1 connections. This should yield faster
2999 execution times when making multiple calls in sequence to the same
3000 xml-rpc server from a single client.
3002 * Introduce support for cookies. Cookies to be sent to the
3003 server with a request can be set using
3004 ++$$xmlrpc_client::setCookie()$$++, while cookies received from
3005 the server are found in ++xmlrpcresp::cookies()++. It is
3006 left to the user to check for validity of received cookies and
3007 decide whether they apply to successive calls or not.
3009 * Better support for detecting different character set encodings
3010 of xml-rpc requests and responses: both client and server objects
3011 will correctly detect the charset encoding of received xml, and use
3012 an appropriate xml parser.
3014 Supported encodings are US-ASCII, UTF-8 and ISO-8859-1.
3016 * Added one new xmlrpcmsg constructor syntax, allowing usage of
3017 a single string with the complete URL of the target server
3019 * Convert xml-rpc boolean values into native php values instead
3022 * Force the ++$$php_xmlrpc_encode$$++ function to properly
3023 encode numerically indexed php arrays into xml-rpc arrays
3024 (numerically indexed php arrays always start with a key of 0 and
3025 increment keys by values of 1)
3027 * Prevent the ++$$php_xmlrpc_encode$$++ function from
3028 further re-encoding any objects of class ++xmlrpcval++ that
3029 are passed to it. This allows to call the function with arguments
3030 consisting of mixed php values / xmlrpcval objects.
3032 * Allow a server to NOT respond to system.* method calls
3033 (setting the ++$$$server->allow_system_funcs$$++
3036 * Implement a new xmlrpcval method to determine if a value of
3037 type struct has a member of a given name without having to loop
3038 trough all members: ++xmlrpcval::structMemExists()++
3040 * Expand methods ++xmlrpcval::addArray++,
3041 ++addScalar++ and ++addStruct++ allowing extra php
3042 values to be added to xmlrpcval objects already formed.
3044 * Let the ++$$xmlrpc_client::send$$++ method accept an XML
3045 string for sending instead of an xmlrpcmsg object, to facilitate
3046 debugging and integration with the php native xmlrpc
3049 * Extend the ++$$php_xmlrpc_encode$$++ and
3050 ++$$php_xmlrpc_decode$$++ functions to allow serialization and
3051 rebuilding of PHP objects. To successfully rebuild a serialized
3052 object, the object class must be defined in the deserializing end of
3053 the transfer. Note that object members of type resource will be
3054 deserialized as NULL values.
3056 Note that his has been implemented adding a "php_class"
3057 attribute to xml representation of xmlrpcval of STRUCT type, which,
3058 strictly speaking, breaks the xml-rpc spec. Other xmlrpc
3059 implementations are supposed to ignore such an attribute (unless
3060 they implement a brain-dead custom xml parser...), so it should be
3061 safe enabling it in heterogeneous environments. The activation of
3062 this feature is done by usage of an option passed as second
3063 parameter to both ++$$php_xmlrpc_encode$$++ and
3064 ++$$php_xmlrpc_decode$$++.
3066 * Extend the ++$$php_xmlrpc_encode$$++ function to allow
3067 automatic serialization of iso8601-conforming php strings as
3068 datetime.iso8601 xmlrpcvals, by usage of an optional
3071 * Added an automatic stub code generator for converting xmlrpc
3072 methods to php functions and vice-versa.
3074 This is done via two new functions:
3075 ++$$wrap_php_function$$++ and ++$$wrap_xmlrpc_method$$++,
3076 and has many caveats, with php being a typeless language and
3079 * Allow object methods to be used in server dispatch map
3081 * Added a complete debugger solution, in the
3084 * Added configurable server-side debug messages, controlled by
3085 the new method ++$$xmlrpc_server::SetDebug()$$++. At level 0,
3086 no debug messages are sent to the client; level 1 is the same as the
3087 old behaviour; at level 2 a lot more info is echoed back to the
3088 client, regarding the received call; at level 3 all warnings raised
3089 during server processing are trapped (this prevents breaking the xml
3090 to be echoed back to the client) and added to the debug info sent
3093 * New XML parsing code, yields smaller memory footprint and
3094 faster execution times, not to mention complete elimination of the
3095 dreaded __eval()__ construct, so prone to code
3098 * Rewritten most of the error messages, making text more
3101 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
3102 <!-- Keep this comment at the end of the file
3107 sgml-minimize-attributes:nil
3108 sgml-always-quote-attributes:t
3111 sgml-parent-document:nil
3112 sgml-exposed-tags:nil
3113 sgml-local-catalogs:nil
3114 sgml-local-ecat-files:nil
3115 sgml-namecase-general:t
3116 sgml-general-insert-case:lower
3119 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
git://git.onelab.eu / plcapi.git / blob