A socket is the backbone of network communication, it establishes the connection between client and server, as well as messages transmission between them.
In PHP, the socket extension implements a low-level interface to the socket communication functions based on the popular BSD sockets, providing the possibility to act as a socket server as well as a client.
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Check if Sockets Support is Enabled
The phpinfo() the function displays information about Sockets. The state is determined by whether Sockets Support is enabled or disabled.
How to Enable Sockets Support in PHP?
Socket extension is packed into PHP when it is installed. However, this extension is not enabled by default. You need to enable it to start using PHP’s socket functions.
On Windows’ XAMPP or WAMP
The name of this extension is php_sockets.dll. It can be found in php\ext.
You will need to modify the PHP configuration file (php.ini) to enable it. Open the file in a text editor and look for the following line:
extension=php_sockets.dllRemove the leading semicolon (;) to uncomment the line and activate the extension.
On Linux
The first step to enabling the Sockets extension is to install it. The easiest way to do this is to use your operating system’s package manager. For example, on a Debian-based system, you can use the following command to install the Sockets extension:
sudo apt-get install php-socketsThen you modify the php.ini file as mentioned above to enable this line:
extension=php_sockets.dllAfter you have made the changes to the PHP configuration file, you will need to restart the web server for the changes to take effect. On a system with Apache installed, the command to restart the web server is:
sudo service apache2 restart
Conclusion
With the Sockets extension enabled, you can now take advantage of its powerful capabilities for creating and managing network sockets in your PHP applications. Whether you need to implement a custom protocol, build a server-side application, or perform any other network-related task, the Sockets extension provides the tools you need to get the job done.
