Ubuntu: How PHP can read Environment Variable

Question

I'm running on Ubuntu server 14.04.

I have a PHP file that needs to read an environment variable and use it.

How can I do that?

Answer 1

If you run a PHP file (e.g. test.php) on Ubuntu server and you need to read and use an environment variable, you need to do the following:

1. Edit the .bashrc file (in case you run bash as a shell)

   # Add the following:
   export DB_NAME="My database name"
   

   IMPORTANT: Do not forget the export word!

2. Save the file and exit.

3. click the following command:

   source ~/.bashrc
   

4. check that the Environment variable is valid

   echo $DB_NAME
   

   It should print:

   My database name
   

5. Edit your PHP file:

   <?php
     $db = getenv('DB_NAME'); // Gets the database name
     echo "Database name: $db  \r\n"
   ?>    
   

6. Run the PHP file

   php test.php
   

   It should print

   Database name: My Database name
   

Answer 2

There is another way of doing it and its doing this on the apache side incase you want to migrate the change on to another server:

Basically it's having the following entry in /etc/environment file

export MY_PROJECT_PATH=/var/www/my-project
export MY_PROJECT_ENV=production
export MY_PROJECT_MAIL=support@my-project.com

export MY_TETS_ENV=my_test_env_value

You'll need to configure apache to read those environment variables.

This has already been answered on stack overflow: @ref: How to get system environment variables into PHP while running CLI & Apache2Handler?