PHP-FPM is FAST - but be wary of using it while your code base is stored on NFS - under average load your NFS server will feel some serious strain. I have yet to find a work around for this bug: https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=52312
FPM (FastCGI Process Manager) is a primary PHP FastCGI implementation containing some features (mostly) useful for heavy-loaded sites.
These features include:
advanced process management with graceful stop/start;
pools that give ability to start workers with different uid/gid/chroot/environment, listening on different ports and using different php.ini (replaces safe_mode);
configurable stdout and stderr logging;
emergency restart in case of accidental opcode cache destruction;
accelerated upload support;
"slowlog" - logging scripts (not just their names, but their PHP backtraces too, using ptrace and similar things to read remote process' execute_data) that are executed unusually slow;
fastcgi_finish_request() - special function to finish request and flush all data while continuing to do something time-consuming (video converting, stats processing etc.);
dynamic/ondemand/static child spawning;
basic and extended status info (similar to Apache mod_status) with various formats like json, xml and openmetrics supported;
php.ini-based config file.
PHP-FPM is FAST - but be wary of using it while your code base is stored on NFS - under average load your NFS server will feel some serious strain. I have yet to find a work around for this bug: https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=52312
php-fpm is not avaliable on Windows, but you can use IIS or Apache as the "fastcgi process manager".
If you have to use Nginx, here is a solution. Nginx provides a load balancing module. We can distribute the request to different php-cgi.exe process.
<http://nginx.org/en/docs/http/load_balancing.html>
<http://nginx.org/en/docs/http/ngx_http_upstream_module.html>
This is the origin nginx conf.
```
location ~ \.php$ {
try_files $uri = 404;
fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000;
fastcgi_index index.php;
include fastcgi.conf;
}
```
You can replace it by
```
upstream php {
server 127.0.0.1:9000;
server 127.0.0.1:9001;
server 127.0.0.1:9002;
server 127.0.0.1:9003;
}
location ~ \.php$ {
try_files $uri = 404;
fastcgi_pass php;
fastcgi_index index.php;
include fastcgi.conf;
}
```
CAUTION!!
php-cgi.exe process will die after several requests, so you have to restart the php-cgi.exe manually to keep a process listening the port.
DON'T USE THIS SOLUTION IN PRODUCTION!!
the fpm process supports the USER2 signal, which is used to reload the config file.
kill -USR2 [pid]
should do the trick.
It looks like the php-fpm daemon is not able to use its groups it is running with.
https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=77837
Init script setup
===
You will probably want to create an init script for your new php-fpm. Fortunately, PHP 5.3.3 provides one for you, which you should copy to your init directory and change permissions:
$ cp <php-5.3.3-source-dir>/sapi/fpm/init.d.php-fpm.in /etc/init.d/php-fpm
$ chmod 755 /etc/init.d/php-fpm
It requires a certain amount of setup. First of all, make sure your php-fpm.conf file is set up to create a PID file when php-fpm starts. E.g.:
----
pid = /var/run/php-fpm.pid
----
(also make sure your php-fpm user has permission to create this file).
Now open up your new init script (/etc/init.d/php-fpm) and set the variables at the top to their relevant values. E.g.:
---
prefix=
exec_prefix=
php_fpm_BIN=/sbin/php-fpm
php_fpm_CONF=/etc/php-fpm.conf
php_fpm_PID=/var/run/php-fpm.pid
---
Your init script is now ready. You should now be able to start, stop and reload php-fpm:
$ /etc/init.d/php-fpm start
$ /etc/init.d/php-fpm stop
$ /etc/init.d/php-fpm reload
The one remaining thing you may wish to do is to add your new php-fpm init script to system start-up. E.g. in CentOS:
$ /sbin/chkconfig php-fpm on
===========
Disclaimer: Although I did just do this on my own server about 20 mins ago, everything I've written here is off the top of my head, so it may not be 100% correct. Also, allow for differences in system setup. Some understanding of what you are doing is assumed.
It is important to note that FPM is not built with the windows binaries. Many of the guides you may find online rely on php-cgi.exe. Unfortunately they call it FPM but this is incorrect!
The executable php-cgi.exe that is bundled with the windows binaries is a FastCGI interface but it is *not* FPM (Fastcgi Process Manager). php-cgi.exe does not have multi-threading or concurrent request support, nor support for any of the FPM configuration options.
The only solid information I've gathered into why FPM is not available is a bug report explaining that FPM is built around fork(), which is not natively available on windows (https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=62447).
Doesn't work? Enable logging!
The php-fpm.log file is a great place to fault-find errors and get to the bottom of a problem. But be sure to enable logging for your specific worker pool. Or you won't see anything!
Example:
To enable error logging for the default [www] worker pool, add this line in the [www] section of your php-fpm.conf:
[www]
catch_workers_output = yes
I'm very unhappy with the way php-fpm handles requests.
There isn't even some SCRIPT_FILENAME in the RFC for CGI, an that's the only standard I found to handle the requests.
Actually what you are doing with PATH_TRANSLATED is supposed to translate to the path, which is broken by media wikis, as they use the PATH_INFO to find the ressource, not some script.
In the original CGI context, the PATH_INFO is passed to the CGI binary to specify some ressource argument. So actually
SCRIPT_NAME ~ argv0
PATH_INFO ~ argv1
in command context.
Conclusion: We should rewrite php-fpm to obey the rfc3875 CGI standard.
Having SCRIPT_NAME pointing to /something.php, must translate to
CWD/something.php
CWD is the working directory where php-fpm is started (or configured to change to).
In case of chroot CWD = "".
In any case the SCRIPT_NAME php script can be found with ./SCRIPT_NAME, from the CWD. So the undocumented not standardized SCRIPT_FILENAME should vanish! It breaks the CGI standard.
in response to "ikrabbe dot ask at gmail dot com" about SCRIPT_NAME and PATH_INFO being empty, this could be related...
while configuring php-fpm with nginx in debian (actually raspberry pi), a comment line in .conf grabbed my attention
there is a "feature" (that looks more like a bug) reported about 10 years ago in http://trac.nginx.org/nginx/ticket/321 ... in which "try_files" could reset the contents of $fastcgi_script_name and $fastcgi_path_info ... this is a workaround mentioned in forums by user "zakaria"
<?php /* not actual php code but nginx .conf */
location ~ [^/]\.php(/|$)
{
fastcgi_split_path_info ^(.+?\.php)(/.*)$;
# Save the $fastcgi_path_info before try_files clear it
set $path_info $fastcgi_path_info;
fastcgi_param PATH_INFO $path_info;
try_files $fastcgi_script_name =404;
fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php5-fpm.sock;
fastcgi_index index.php;
include fastcgi_params;
}
?>
@ ikrabbe you might want to look at mod_rewrite to address the environment variable variation(!) between cgi and cli php.
in response to "dreamcat4 at gmail dot com" about enabling logs in php-fpm
i *hate* going blind, so enabling logs is generally the first thing i do...
by doing dreamcat4 suggestion, logs got enabled but mixed with php process logs ... instead doing that and to isolate logs from [www] worker pool in its own file, these directives worked for me in "www" worker .ini file (you have to set directories and permissions before)
php_admin_flag[log_errors] = on
php_admin_value[error_log] = /var/log/php-fpm/www-error.log