333
votes

I wrote a PHP code like this

$site="http://www.google.com";
$content = file_get_content($site);
echo $content;

But when I remove "http://" from $site I get the following warning:

Warning: file_get_contents(www.google.com) [function.file-get-contents]: failed to open stream:

I tried try and catch but it didn't work.

20
Also an interesting approach: stackoverflow.com/questions/6718598/…Hugo Stieglitz
Use try-catch with set_error_handler-function as said here stackoverflow.com/a/3406181/1046909MingalevME
If you remove http:// from url, then you are looking for a file "www.google.com" on your local disk.Rauli Rajande
How can this get so much attention and upvotes. Why would you remove the protocol information. Even in 2008, you had FTP and HTTPS.Daniel W.

20 Answers

547
votes

Step 1: check the return code: if($content === FALSE) { // handle error here... }

Step 2: suppress the warning by putting an error control operator (i.e. @) in front of the call to file_get_contents(): $content = @file_get_contents($site);

160
votes

You can also set your error handler as an anonymous function that calls an Exception and use a try / catch on that exception.

set_error_handler(
    function ($severity, $message, $file, $line) {
        throw new ErrorException($message, $severity, $severity, $file, $line);
    }
);

try {
    file_get_contents('www.google.com');
}
catch (Exception $e) {
    echo $e->getMessage();
}

restore_error_handler();

Seems like a lot of code to catch one little error, but if you're using exceptions throughout your app, you would only need to do this once, way at the top (in an included config file, for instance), and it will convert all your errors to Exceptions throughout.

76
votes

My favourite way to do this is fairly simple:

if (false !== ($data = file_get_contents("http://www.google.com"))) {
      $error = error_get_last();
      echo "HTTP request failed. Error was: " . $error['message'];
} else {
      echo "Everything went better than expected";
}

I found this after experimenting with the try/catch from @enobrev above, but this allows for less lengthy (and IMO, more readable) code. We simply use error_get_last to get the text of the last error, and file_get_contents returns false on failure, so a simple "if" can catch that.

37
votes

You can prepend an @: $content = @file_get_contents($site);

This will supress any warning - use sparingly!. See Error Control Operators

Edit: When you remove the 'http://' you're no longer looking for a web page, but a file on your disk called "www.google....."

24
votes

One alternative is to suppress the error and also throw an exception which you can catch later. This is especially useful if there are multiple calls to file_get_contents() in your code, since you don't need to suppress and handle all of them manually. Instead, several calls can be made to this function in a single try/catch block.

// Returns the contents of a file
function file_contents($path) {
    $str = @file_get_contents($path);
    if ($str === FALSE) {
        throw new Exception("Cannot access '$path' to read contents.");
    } else {
        return $str;
    }
}

// Example
try {
    file_contents("a");
    file_contents("b");
    file_contents("c");
} catch (Exception $e) {
    // Deal with it.
    echo "Error: " , $e->getMessage();
}
15
votes

Here's how I did it... No need for try-catch block... The best solution is always the simplest... Enjoy!

$content = @file_get_contents("http://www.google.com");
if (strpos($http_response_header[0], "200")) { 
   echo "SUCCESS";
} else { 
   echo "FAILED";
} 
15
votes
function custom_file_get_contents($url) {
    return file_get_contents(
        $url,
        false,
        stream_context_create(
            array(
                'http' => array(
                    'ignore_errors' => true
                )
            )
        )
    );
}

$content=FALSE;

if($content=custom_file_get_contents($url)) {
    //play with the result
} else {
    //handle the error
}
6
votes

Here's how I handle that:

$this->response_body = @file_get_contents($this->url, false, $context);
if ($this->response_body === false) {
    $error = error_get_last();
    $error = explode(': ', $error['message']);
    $error = trim($error[2]) . PHP_EOL;
    fprintf(STDERR, 'Error: '. $error);
    die();
}
4
votes

The best thing would be to set your own error and exception handlers which will do something usefull like logging it in a file or emailing critical ones. http://www.php.net/set_error_handler

1
votes

You could use this script

$url = @file_get_contents("http://www.itreb.info");
if ($url) {
    // if url is true execute this 
    echo $url;
} else {
    // if not exceute this 
    echo "connection error";
}
1
votes

Since PHP 4 use error_reporting():

$site="http://www.google.com";
$old_error_reporting = error_reporting(E_ALL ^ E_WARNING);
$content = file_get_content($site);
error_reporting($old_error_reporting);
if ($content === FALSE) {
    echo "Error getting '$site'";
} else {
    echo $content;
}
1
votes

Simplest way to do this is just prepend an @ before file_get_contents, i. e.:

$content = @file_get_contents($site); 
1
votes

something like this:

public function get($curl,$options){
    $context = stream_context_create($options);
    $file = @file_get_contents($curl, false, $context);
    $str1=$str2=$status=null;
    sscanf($http_response_header[0] ,'%s %d %s', $str1,$status, $str2);
    if($status==200)
        return $file        
    else 
        throw new \Exception($http_response_header[0]);
}
0
votes
if (!file_get_contents($data)) {
  exit('<h1>ERROR MESSAGE</h1>');
} else {
      return file_get_contents($data);
}
0
votes

Enable allow_url_fopen From cPanel Or WHM then Try Hope it will Fix

-2
votes

You should use file_exists() function before to use file_get_contents(). With this way you'll avoid the php warning.

$file = "path/to/file";

if(file_exists($file)){
  $content = file_get_contents($file);
}
-3
votes
try {
   $site="http://www.google.com";
   $content = file_get_content($site);
   echo $content;
} catch (ErrorException $e) {
    // fix the url

}

set_error_handler(function ($errorNumber, $errorText, $errorFile,$errorLine ) 
{
    throw new ErrorException($errorText, 0, $errorNumber, $errorFile, $errorLine);
});
-3
votes

You should also set the

allow_url_use = On 

in your php.ini to stop receiving warnings.

-4
votes

Change the file php.ini

allow_url_fopen = On

allow_url_include = On
-4
votes

This will try to get the data, if it does not work, it will catch the error and allow you to do anything you need within the catch.

try {
    $content = file_get_contents($site);
} catch(\Exception $e) {
    return 'The file was not found';
}