[php] How to create websockets server in PHP

I am looking for a simple code to create a WebSocket server. I found phpwebsockets but it is outdated now and doesn't support the newest protocol. I tried updating it myself but it doesn't seem to work.

#!/php -q
<?php  /*  >php -q server.php  */

error_reporting(E_ALL);
set_time_limit(0);
ob_implicit_flush();

$master  = WebSocket("localhost",12345);
$sockets = array($master);
$users   = array();
$debug   = false;

while(true){
  $changed = $sockets;
  socket_select($changed,$write=NULL,$except=NULL,NULL);
  foreach($changed as $socket){
    if($socket==$master){
      $client=socket_accept($master);
      if($client<0){ console("socket_accept() failed"); continue; }
      else{ connect($client); }
    }
    else{
      $bytes = @socket_recv($socket,$buffer,2048,0);
      if($bytes==0){ disconnect($socket); }
      else{
        $user = getuserbysocket($socket);
        if(!$user->handshake){ dohandshake($user,$buffer); }
        else{ process($user,$buffer); }
      }
    }
  }
}

//---------------------------------------------------------------
function process($user,$msg){
  $action = unwrap($msg);
  say("< ".$action);
  switch($action){
    case "hello" : send($user->socket,"hello human");                       break;
    case "hi"    : send($user->socket,"zup human");                         break;
    case "name"  : send($user->socket,"my name is Multivac, silly I know"); break;
    case "age"   : send($user->socket,"I am older than time itself");       break;
    case "date"  : send($user->socket,"today is ".date("Y.m.d"));           break;
    case "time"  : send($user->socket,"server time is ".date("H:i:s"));     break;
    case "thanks": send($user->socket,"you're welcome");                    break;
    case "bye"   : send($user->socket,"bye");                               break;
    default      : send($user->socket,$action." not understood");           break;
  }
}

function send($client,$msg){
  say("> ".$msg);
  $msg = wrap($msg);
  socket_write($client,$msg,strlen($msg));
}

function WebSocket($address,$port){
  $master=socket_create(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, SOL_TCP)     or die("socket_create() failed");
  socket_set_option($master, SOL_SOCKET, SO_REUSEADDR, 1)  or die("socket_option() failed");
  socket_bind($master, $address, $port)                    or die("socket_bind() failed");
  socket_listen($master,20)                                or die("socket_listen() failed");
  echo "Server Started : ".date('Y-m-d H:i:s')."\n";
  echo "Master socket  : ".$master."\n";
  echo "Listening on   : ".$address." port ".$port."\n\n";
  return $master;
}

function connect($socket){
  global $sockets,$users;
  $user = new User();
  $user->id = uniqid();
  $user->socket = $socket;
  array_push($users,$user);
  array_push($sockets,$socket);
  console($socket." CONNECTED!");
}

function disconnect($socket){
  global $sockets,$users;
  $found=null;
  $n=count($users);
  for($i=0;$i<$n;$i++){
    if($users[$i]->socket==$socket){ $found=$i; break; }
  }
  if(!is_null($found)){ array_splice($users,$found,1); }
  $index = array_search($socket,$sockets);
  socket_close($socket);
  console($socket." DISCONNECTED!");
  if($index>=0){ array_splice($sockets,$index,1); }
}

function dohandshake($user,$buffer){
  console("\nRequesting handshake...");
  console($buffer);
  //list($resource,$host,$origin,$strkey1,$strkey2,$data) 
  list($resource,$host,$u,$c,$key,$protocol,$version,$origin,$data) = getheaders($buffer);
  console("Handshaking...");

    $acceptkey = base64_encode(sha1($key . "258EAFA5-E914-47DA-95CA-C5AB0DC85B11",true));
  $upgrade  = "HTTP/1.1 101 Switching Protocols\r\nUpgrade: websocket\r\nConnection: Upgrade\r\nSec-WebSocket-Accept: $acceptkey\r\n";

  socket_write($user->socket,$upgrade,strlen($upgrade));
  $user->handshake=true;
  console($upgrade);
  console("Done handshaking...");
  return true;
}

function getheaders($req){
    $r=$h=$u=$c=$key=$protocol=$version=$o=$data=null;
    if(preg_match("/GET (.*) HTTP/"   ,$req,$match)){ $r=$match[1]; }
    if(preg_match("/Host: (.*)\r\n/"  ,$req,$match)){ $h=$match[1]; }
    if(preg_match("/Upgrade: (.*)\r\n/",$req,$match)){ $u=$match[1]; }
    if(preg_match("/Connection: (.*)\r\n/",$req,$match)){ $c=$match[1]; }
    if(preg_match("/Sec-WebSocket-Key: (.*)\r\n/",$req,$match)){ $key=$match[1]; }
    if(preg_match("/Sec-WebSocket-Protocol: (.*)\r\n/",$req,$match)){ $protocol=$match[1]; }
    if(preg_match("/Sec-WebSocket-Version: (.*)\r\n/",$req,$match)){ $version=$match[1]; }
    if(preg_match("/Origin: (.*)\r\n/",$req,$match)){ $o=$match[1]; }
    if(preg_match("/\r\n(.*?)\$/",$req,$match)){ $data=$match[1]; }
    return array($r,$h,$u,$c,$key,$protocol,$version,$o,$data);
}

function getuserbysocket($socket){
  global $users;
  $found=null;
  foreach($users as $user){
    if($user->socket==$socket){ $found=$user; break; }
  }
  return $found;
}

function     say($msg=""){ echo $msg."\n"; }
function    wrap($msg=""){ return chr(0).$msg.chr(255); }
function  unwrap($msg=""){ return substr($msg,1,strlen($msg)-2); }
function console($msg=""){ global $debug; if($debug){ echo $msg."\n"; } }

class User{
  var $id;
  var $socket;
  var $handshake;
}

?>

and the client:

var connection = new WebSocket('ws://localhost:12345');
connection.onopen = function () {
  connection.send('Ping'); // Send the message 'Ping' to the server
};

// Log errors
connection.onerror = function (error) {
  console.log('WebSocket Error ' + error);
};

// Log messages from the server
connection.onmessage = function (e) {
  console.log('Server: ' + e.data);
};

If there is anything wrong in my code can you help me fix it? Concole in firefox says

Firefox can't establish a connection to the server at ws://localhost:12345/.

I was in your shoes for a while and finally ended up using node.js, because it can do hybrid solutions like having web and socket server in one. So php backend can submit requests thru http to node web server and then broadcast it with websocket. Very efficiant way to go.

Need to convert the the key from hex to dec before base64_encoding and then send it for handshake.

$hashedKey = sha1($key. "258EAFA5-E914-47DA-95CA-C5AB0DC85B11",true);

$rawToken = "";
    for ($i = 0; $i < 20; $i++) {
      $rawToken .= chr(hexdec(substr($hashedKey,$i*2, 2)));
    }
$handshakeToken = base64_encode($rawToken) . "\r\n";

$handshakeResponse = "HTTP/1.1 101 Switching Protocols\r\nUpgrade: websocket\r\nConnection: Upgrade\r\nSec-WebSocket-Accept: $handshakeToken\r\n";

As far as I'm aware Ratchet is the best PHP WebSocket solution available at the moment. And since it's open source you can see how the author has built this WebSocket solution using PHP.

I've searched the minimal solution possible to do PHP + WebSockets during hours, until I found this article:

Super simple PHP WebSocket example

It doesn't require any third-party library.

Here is how to do it: create a index.html containing this:

<html>
<body>
    <div id="root"></div>
    <script>
        var host = 'ws://<<<IP_OF_YOUR_SERVER>>>:12345/websockets.php';
        var socket = new WebSocket(host);
        socket.onmessage = function(e) {
            document.getElementById('root').innerHTML = e.data;
        };
    </script>
</body>
</html>

and open it in the browser, just after you have launched php websockets.php in the command-line (yes, it will be an event loop, constantly running PHP script), with this websockets.php file.

<?php

// server.php

$server = stream_socket_server("tcp://127.0.0.1:8001", $errno, $errorMessage);

if($server == false) {
    throw new Exception("Could not bind to socket: $errorMessage");

}

for(;;) {
    $client = @stream_socket_accept($server);

    if($client) {
        stream_copy_to_stream($client, $client);
        fclose($client);
    }
}

from one terminal run : php server.php

from another terminal run: echo "hello woerld" | nc 127.0.0.1 8002