PHP exec - check if enabled or disabled

Question

Is there a way to check in a php script if exec() is enabled or disabled on a server?

Solution 1

if(function_exists('exec')) {
    echo "exec is enabled";
}

Solution 2

This will check if the function actually works (permissions, rights, etc):

if(@exec('echo EXEC') == 'EXEC'){
    echo 'exec works';
}

Solution 3

ini_get('disable_functions')

What you actually want to do is use ini_get('disable_functions') to find out if it is available to you:

<?php
function exec_enabled() {
    $disabled = explode(',', ini_get('disable_functions'));
    return !in_array('exec', $disabled);
}
?>

Answered on stackoverflow here: Check if "exec" is disabled, Which actually seems to come from the PHP Man page: http://php.net/manual/en/function.exec.php#97187

Path

If the above returns true (you can use exec()), but PHP can still not trigger the script there is a good chance that you have a path issue for that script, test this by doing:

print exec('which bash');

and then try

print exec('which ogr2ogr');

Solution 4

This will check that exec is available and enabled BEFORE trying to run it. If you run exec() and the function does not exist or is disabled a warning will be generated. Depending on the server settings that may render to the browser and will almost-always write a line to a log file = performance hit.

// Exec function exists.
// Exec is not disabled.
// Safe Mode is not on.
$exec_enabled =
   function_exists('exec') &&
   !in_array('exec', array_map('trim', explode(', ', ini_get('disable_functions')))) &&
   strtolower(ini_get('safe_mode')) != 1
;


if($exec_enabled) { exec('blah'); }

Solution 5

It's a bit tricky to find exec function available until unless checking all possibilities

1.function_exist('exec')

2.Scanning through ini_get('disabled_functions)

3.Checking safe_mode enabled

function is_shell_exec_available() {
    if (in_array(strtolower(ini_get('safe_mode')), array('on', '1'), true) || (!function_exists('exec'))) {
        return false;
    }
    $disabled_functions = explode(',', ini_get('disable_functions'));
    $exec_enabled = !in_array('exec', $disabled_functions);
    return ($exec_enabled) ? true : false;
}

This function never throws warnings unless ini_get function not disabled.

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