EasyApache 4 and the ea-php-cli Package
Last modified: April 22, 2021
Overview
The ea-php-cli
package is EasyApache 4’s replacement for the system-provided /usr/bin/php
binary. This package determines the PHP version that the user’s application requires from the system. While the stock version of the /usr/bin/php
binary assumes a single version of PHP, cPanel & WHM’s ea-php-cli
package determines the correct version of PHP to execute.
What do the ea-php-cli packages do?
The ea-php-cli
package installs the following PHP binaries:
/usr/bin/php
— This executable uses thephp-cgi
binary for the specified PHP version./usr/local/bin/php
— This executable uses thephp-cli
binary for the specified PHP version.
When you install a PHP version, the system also installs the ea-php-cli-lsphp
package. This package contains the /usr/bin/lsphp
binary. This executable uses the lsphp
(Litespeed) binary for the specified PHP version.
The ea-php-cli-lsphp
package manages this binary. If you can not call this binary, you can install it manually with the following command:
yum install ea-php-cli-lsphp
These binaries ensure that your system uses the correct PHP handler for your request.
What is the difference between the two directory paths?
The /usr/bin/php
binary calls the PHP CGI handler. The /usr/local/bin/php
binary calls the PHP command-line handler. This works with most system’s default PATH
settings, and ensures compatibility with EasyApache 3 behavior.
What is lsphp?
The /usr/bin/lsph
p binary calls the Litespeed (lsphp
) binary. This works with most system’s default PATH
settings and ensures that the system correctly calls Litespeed.
/usr/local/bin/lsphp
to call this binary.
The system default PHP configuration file
The system uses the /etc/cpanel/ea4/php.conf
file to determine the system’s default PHP version and the PHP handler that each PHP version uses.
If a PHP file’s PHP version is not explicitly set, the system uses the default entry in the /etc/cpanel/ea4/php.conf
file to determine which version of PHP to use.
Set the system’s default PHP version and an individual domain’s PHP version in WHM’s MultiPHP Manager interface (WHM » Home » Software » MultiPHP Manager). You can also set the system’s default PHP version with the /usr/local/cpanel/bin/rebuild_phpconf
script. For more information, read our PHP documentation.
- If you configure a file or the system with an invalid package, the executable exits with an error message.
- If you configure the file or system with a package that does not contain the necessary binary, the executable displays a warning message and uses the system default version of PHP.
- If both a file’s configured version of PHP and the system default version of PHP are unavailable, the executable exits with an error.
php.conf
file, your settings may not persist.
How to call the ea-php-cli binaries
To call the ea-php-cli
binaries, run the one of the following commands, where filename.php
represents the file that you wish to process:
/usr/bin/php <options> filename.php
/usr/local/bin/php <options> filename.php
/usr/bin/lsphp <options> filename.php
To run PHP from the command line, your command might resemble the following example:
/usr/bin/php /home/bob/public_html/domain/app/periodic_job.php
The system uses the user’s configured PHP path to determine which PHP version it calls.
The ea-php-cli cache symlink
The first time you call one of the ea-php-cli
binaries, the system creates the .ea-php-cli.cache
symlink to the PHP version that the directory requires. This symlink provides a quick way for the system to determine the proper version of PHP and reads as broken by design. For example, if the PHP script requires PHP 7.0, then the symlink will point to ea-php70
.
We strongly recommend that you do not delete these symlinks. The system creates broken symlinks by design and will recreate any removed symlinks the next time that you run the script. You can safely ignore them.
Override the default ea-php-cli behavior
If you want to override the file’s configured version of PHP, use the /usr/bin/ea-php##
symlink, where ##
represents the two-digit PHP version that you wish to use. Your command might resemble the following example:
/usr/bin/ea-php72 filename.php
If you want to override the file’s configured version of PHP with a custom .ini
file, run the following command, where ##
represents the two-digit PHP version that you wish to use:
ea-php70 -c /custom/directory/custom-file.ini my_script.php
You can also use the --ea-reference-dir=directory
option to tell the system to use the PHP version set in the specified directory. Your command might resemble the following example, where directory
represents the path to the directory that you wish to reference:
/usr/bin/php --ea-reference-dir=directory /usr/local/share/whatever.php
We deprecated the -ea_php
option in the ea-php-cli
version 1.0.0 RPM. We will remove this option in November 2019.
The system passes all other options that you provide to the PHP binary.
For more information, read our PHP Home documentation.