Do PHP files need a certain extension, like .php?

[DaveJ]

I need to insert a little script that reads from a Wordpress blog, and then displays a blogroll on our main webpage. Everything is on the same server. The person that created the website made the main page index.shtml. Do I need to change it to index.php to get PHP scripts to work?

Thanks,
Dave

[tabatha]

1. Yes.

Anything with php in it, has to have the extension, e.g.

index.php

[DaveJ]

3. I'll try it

Although post 2 indicates otherwise, I'll try both ways and see how it goes.

Thanks

[SirRevolutionary]

2. I think shtml is all about includes

I don't think you need to change any extensions to php at all. Take a look at the source code for that index.shtml page first and see how they include other scripts. This link might help http://rssfeedreader.com/portal/php

[DaveJ]

4. Great link, thanks.

This obviously is my first PHP endeavor, so that really helps. I'll get back to you all with the results. Thanks again.

[ixion]

5. you don't necessarily have to use php, if you want to edit your server config

and map another mime type to be processed by php.

By default, though, yeah, it needs to be that way.

[DaveJ]

6. That explains the ambiguity

Hopefully I can edit the server config. I'm not sure though, since it's a shared server. I will see. Thanks.

[tranche]

7. If you have access to an .htaccess file or your httpd.conf file:

You can add something like this:

AddType application/x-httpd-php .shtml

Basically, you can indeed execute PHP code in just about any filetype if you specify it.

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1581765/can-we-include-php-file-in-html-file
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1672391/html-php-do-i-need-to-change-the-extension-of-html-file

or you could just have your PHP script spit out a .shtml (.inc) file and include that in your index.shtml file.

[SirRevolutionary]

8. <-- what tranche said. Makes sense

You can call it ".whatever" as long as the server knows that its really executable PHP. It's been a while, but I'm pretty sure I have some .info files that hold PHP scripts for some of my sites, and they're used as includes. Most likely, that's built into Zend framework or something else I've used, or it's already set up in my Zend config files, but as long as the server configs knows what to expect it should work fine.

[greyl]

9. The .htaccess solution is probably easiest and most elegant. nt

[DaveJ]

10. Ok, got it working using the last method

I added <!--#include virtual="/blog_roll.php" --> to the SHTML page and put my code in blog_roll.php.

PHP is not enabled by default in SHTML files, and I did not feel like going into .htaccess. I've done that to do a bunch of 301 redirects but it's not really necessary here (long story but the ISP's control panel is firewalled from our network). Using the include is nice and clean.

Thanks!

[HopeHoops]

11. Test it as is. The extensions are becoming less important to the server software, however,

they are still extremely important to the developer. I use them on Mac & Linux even though they aren't necessary just to give me a clue as to what kind of file I'm dealing with. Double-clicking on damn near anything usually brings up an appropriate application now.

[boppers]

12. A web page I wrote/edited on this a few years back:

http://www.php.net/manual/en/security.hiding.php

You can even use ".bop" as a file extension... it's a little vanity joke I put into the official documentation. Basically, the extension just needs to be mapped to an application.