I am having much trouble getting a simple coding concept to work in a new environment and would appreciate some insight.

Senario: Root of web app stores "_application.php" This is a page that is required on the top of everypage. It checks on things and generates a nav menu that uses images. Modules for the app are stored in subfolders. Pages in the subfolders require the appliction file.

This is standard coding practices I've used in IIS PHP application development, and hosted web site development. Bascially, create 1 menu or footer and include it on every user viewable page in the root and sub folder. I have never run into this not working.


Now I am in a new environment (new job) and this does not work. I get the following errors: (This is from a sandboxed development instance so I can change configs and figure this out for the production environment)

---Begin Error Message---
Warning: main(_MenuTop.php) [function.main]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in c:\Program Files\Apache Group\Apache2jh\htdocs\PathPortal\TestChange\index.php on line 17

Fatal error: main() [function.require]: Failed opening required '_MenuTop.php' (include_path='.;c:\phpjh\includes') in c:\Program Files\Apache Group\Apache2jh\htdocs\PathPortal\TestChange\index.php on line 17
---EndError Message---

My co-workers tell me that this is standard out of the box functionality. I dont think it is, by default I thought you could include from a parent folder, as long as it was in the site.

I can verify safe mode is off.

I can't figure out what the reason for this is.

Anyone seen this before?

This post has been edited by YoYo-Pete: 9 Jan, 2008 - 11:44 AM

Rather than go up one directory, why don't you add that directory in to the include path?

I was toying with it, but that would mean recoding a bunch of stuff.

That is my last resort. I'm more concerned on why this functionality is the way it is.

My solution ended up setting up a generic includes folder in my PHP installation.

My app is modules that are contained in folders off the root of the app. I was going to put a virtual directory in each folder to point at the main media folder off the root, but because this was apache, it required config changes and what not, which mean change control hoops to jump through.

Instead I passed path informtion in variables and used those to hard code paths instead of using relative paths.

My web dev roots are in CFML, so my methodoligies use the concept of the "application.cfm" page. While PHP doesnt have this (that I know about), I am manually using a require_once at everypage to fake it.

Kudos to no2pencil who had it right. At this point I've got a great framework up and running. Thanks!

Good to hear that you got it working!

That's the pain with automated systems... when they don't work you have to clean up their mess.