[php] file_get_contents behind a proxy?

At work we have to use a proxy to basically access port 80 for example, we have our own custom logins for each user.

My temporary workaround is using curl to basically login as myself through a proxy and access the external data I need.

Is there some sort of advanced php setting I can set so that internally whenever it tries to invoke something like file_get_contents() it always goes through a proxy? I'm on Windows ATM so it'd be a pain to recompile if that's the only way.

The reason my workaround is temporary is because I need a solution that's generic and works for multiple users instead of using one user's credentials ( Ive considered requesting a separate user account solely to do this but passwords change often and this technique needs to be deployed throughout a dozen or more sites ). I don't want to hard-code credentials basically to use the curl workaround.

There's a similar post here: http://techpad.co.uk/content.php?sid=137 which explains how to do it.

function file_get_contents_proxy($url,$proxy){

    // Create context stream
    $context_array = array('http'=>array('proxy'=>$proxy,'request_fulluri'=>true));
    $context = stream_context_create($context_array);

    // Use context stream with file_get_contents
    $data = file_get_contents($url,false,$context);

    // Return data via proxy
    return $data;

}

Use stream_context_set_default function. It is much easier to use as you can directly use file_get_contents or similar functions without passing any additional parameters

This blog post explains how to use it. Here is the code from that page.

<?php
// Edit the four values below
$PROXY_HOST = "proxy.example.com"; // Proxy server address
$PROXY_PORT = "1234";    // Proxy server port
$PROXY_USER = "LOGIN";    // Username
$PROXY_PASS = "PASSWORD";   // Password
// Username and Password are required only if your proxy server needs basic authentication

$auth = base64_encode("$PROXY_USER:$PROXY_PASS");
stream_context_set_default(
 array(
  'http' => array(
   'proxy' => "tcp://$PROXY_HOST:$PROXY_PORT",
   'request_fulluri' => true,
   'header' => "Proxy-Authorization: Basic $auth"
   // Remove the 'header' option if proxy authentication is not required
  )
 )
);

$url = "http://www.pirob.com/";

print_r( get_headers($url) );

echo file_get_contents($url);
?>

Depending on how the proxy login works stream_context_set_default might help you.

$context  = stream_context_set_default(
  array(
    'http'=>array(
      'header'=>'Authorization: Basic ' . base64_encode('username'.':'.'userpass')
    )
  )
);
$result = file_get_contents('http://..../...');