Any way to always send HHVM all request to same file in server mode (not FastCGI)?

Question

Working setup, assume a request to http://127.0.0.1:8080/path/to/resource:

• nginx/apache receives the request and passes it to index.php behind the scenes to hhvm vi FastCGI.
• After the the handoff via FastCGI, the $_SERVER['SCRIPT_NAME'] is always index.php and the $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'] is from the url /path/to/resource (notice, no index.php anywhere in it)
• I've got a framework with an index.php file in /some/path/public/index.php
• All requests go to index.php and have their URI's (in this case `/path/to/resource) parsed by a routing system.
• The actual code handling the request have no structural relation in form to the URI (i.e. there's no /path/to/resource/index.php)

In order to take nginx or apache out of the picture when running hhvm for dev purposes or just fun, I run hhvm in server mode (NOT FastCGI mode!!!):

cd /some/path/public/
hhvm -m server -p 8080

However, the framework doesn't handle the index.php in the path gracefully. When served by hhvm running in server mode the only urls that work are:

 http://127.0.0.1:8080/index.php
 ...or...
 http://127.0.0.1:8080

Anything more complex fails like:

http://127.0.0.1:8080/path/to/resource  (HHVM fails, file not found)

Also, sticking in an explicit index.php fails as the framework doesn't handle the index.php in the REQUEST_URI gracefully.

http://127.0.0.1:8080/index.php/path/to/resource  (HHVM works, but framework fails, `index.php` in uri confuses it)

Does anyone know a way to get this to work where ALL request are sent to the root /some/path/public/index.php? Is there an option to set the SCRIPT_NAME explicitly via a option flag/setting?

Ideally the request http://127.0.0.1:8080/path/to/resource would have:

• SCRIPT_NAME = index.php
• REQUEST_URI = /path/to/resource

Answer 1

Ok, I figured a few ways, running HHVM 3.18.1 with some help from another SO user.

The best way is to use virtual hosts rewite rules:

hhvm.server.default_document = index.php

hhvm.virtual_host[default][rewrite_rules][common][pattern] = "(.*)"
hhvm.virtual_host[default][rewrite_rules][common][to] = "index.php/$1"
hhvm.virtual_host[default][rewrite_rules][common][qsa] = true

Had a hard time finding documentation on this, but here's a link to the HHVM docs sort of explaining: https://docs.hhvm.com/hhvm/configuration/INI-settings#server-mode__virtual-host-format

Note that the documentation is the old format, not the new ini format, so option names should be converted from CamelCase to underscore seperated like camel_case.

Another, less elegant way: Without using rewrites, you can hijack 404's. You need to set BOTH the parameters

• hhvm.server.error_document404
• hhvm.server.default_document

Set both of these to whatever your default index/routing file is--let your framework handle 404 messages.

You can set these in an ini config file (I'll call it server.ini):

 hhvm.server.default_document = /path/to/index.php
 hhvm.server.error_document404 = /path/to/index.php

Then you can start the server with:

 hhvm -m server  -p 8080  -c /path/to/server.ini

You can also skip the INI file and pass the details in when starting HHVM:

 hhvm -m server -p 8080 -d  hhvm.server.default_document=/path/to/index.php -d hhvm.server.error_document404=/path/to/index.php

If you don't want to have to run hhvm from a specific folder, you can also set:

hhvm.server.source_root=/path/to/doc_root

Notes:

• If this is set the default_document and error_document404 will be relative to this directory unless they have fully qualified paths. However, you must set the error_document404 to something explicitly. While default_document seems to default to index.php, the error_document404 seems not to have a default value.
• Explicitly including index.php in the url (unless it's alone) fails. This means: http://127.0.0.1:8080/index.php/path/to/resource fails but http://127.0.0.1:8080/path/to/resource now works. Guess you can't have your cake and eat it too :)

Answer 2

As of HHVM 4.26, you can use the hhvm.server.global_document setting in server.ini.

An example would be:

hhvm.server.global_document = index.hh

All requests will now go through index.hh