* dan nessett dnessett@yahoo.com [Tue, 11 Aug 2009 09:00:50 -0700 (PDT)]:
I'm probably missing something since I have only been programming in
PHP
for about 4 weeks, but if you set include_path in php.ini so it
includes
the root of the MW tree, put a php file at that level that has a function (or a method in a class) that returns the MW root path, wouldn't that work? For example, if you modified include_path in
php.ini
to include <pathname to MW root>, added the file MWInit.php to the MW root directory and in MWInit.php put a function MWInit() that computes and returns $IP, wouldn't that eliminate the necessity of manually figuring out the value of $IP [each place where you now compute $IP could require_once('MWInit.php') and call MWInit()]?
Of course, it may be considered dangerous for the MW installation software to fool around with php.ini. But, even if you require setting the MW root manually in php.ini::include_path (abusing the php
namespace
disambiguation operator here) that would be an improvement. You should only have to do this once and could upgrade MW without disturbing this binding.
Sorry for interrupting the conversation, but not everyone have root rights to change php.ini freely. (MediaWiki can be used at shared hosting sometimes). I'd better define a shell variable for that ($MW_INSTALL_PATH). Dmitriy