PHP Tutorial - PHP readfile() Function

Definition

The readfile() function reads a file and writes it to the output buffer.

Syntax

PHP readfile() Function has the following syntax.

readfile(filename,include_path,context)

Parameter

Parameter	is Required	Description
filename	Required.	File to read
include_path	Optional.	'1' means to search for the file in the include_path in php.ini
context	Optional.	Context of the file handle.

Return

This function returns the number of bytes read on success, or FALSE and an error on failure.

You can hide the error output by adding an '@' in front of the function name.

Example

When passed a filename as readfile()'s only parameter, readfile() will attempt to open it, read it all into memory.

If successful, readfile() will return an integer equal to the number of bytes read from the file.

If unsuccessful, readfile() will return false.

Here is an example script:


<?PHP
      $testfile = @readfile("test.txt");
      if (!$testfile) {
             print "Could not open file.\n";
      }
?>

If readfile() fails to open the file, it will print an error message to the screen. You can suppress this by placing an @ symbol before the function call.

The code above generates the following result.