remote fopen(), R.I.P.
Well, my ISP decided to disable remote fopen() calls in PHP today. I can see why, considering it’s a pretty big security hole in PHP.
Looks like I had my hosting account’s e-mail notifications set to only the highest priority (why this wasn’t high priority, I have no idea /boggle), so I didn’t see the original announcement about it. Or the second announcement posted this afternoon. So, of course, 3/4 of the RSS feeds I had running on my various sites decided to keel over and die in the meantime.
However, in the process of fixing things, I came across a link to an excellent primer on using libcurl (the client URL library supported by PHP.) If you’ve never used curl before, it’s a good article that explains how to replace your old, flawed, broken fopen() calls relatively easily.
Either way, looks like all my feeds are working properly again, including the WordPress flickr gallery plug-in I use, which took a little doing to fix.
Hi Nick,
After several hours frustratingly hacking flickr-gallery plugins, I have realized that I am not a tech savvy guy. Not even close. My host (Dreamhost, I think it’s the same as yours) disable the allow_url_fopen function. too. I really want my flickr-gallery back to live again. Can you share your secret about this issue? Any help will be deeply appreciated.
Maybe you can share your hacked flickr-gallery plugins? I think there might be a lot of people like me, poor non-techie, in urgent need. Thanks. :)
Hey Froggy,
Thanks for the comment. I’ll post up a copy of the updated Flickr Gallery source code (using curl instead of fopen) later today for public consumption. Hope it helps. :)
-nick