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POHow to open an application via php and perl?
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  1. POHow to open an application via php and perl?
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    copied!<p>I am trying to print generated forms / receipts through PHP (the printers will be installed on the server, I am not attempting to print to a user's local printer). I have decided to try the following methodology:</p> <p>IN PHP:</p> <ol> <li>Generate a PDF file and save it on the server.</li> <li>Call a perl script to print said PDF file.</li> </ol> <p>IN perl:</p> <ol> <li>Use <code>system()</code> to "open" Reader and print the given PDF silently.</li> </ol> <p>What works:</p> <ul> <li>I can generate PDFs in PHP.</li> <li>I can call a perl script. <ul> <li>If the script has errors, they report to the browser window. ie: If I purposely change file paths it fails, and reports the appropriate reason.</li> </ul></li> <li>functions such as <code>printf</code> seem to work fine as the output displays in the browser.</li> <li>The exact same perl script (with the "non-functioning" line mentioned below) works properly when executed from the command line or the IDE.</li> </ul> <p>What doesn't work:</p> <ul> <li>In perl: <code>system('"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Adobe\\Reader 10.0\\Reader\\AcroRd32.exe" /N /T "C:\\test.pdf" 0-XEROX');</code></li> </ul> <p>What happens:</p> <ul> <li>NOTHING! I get no errors. It just flat out refuses to open Adobe Reader. All code below this line seems to run fine. It's like the function is being ignored. I am at a loss as to why, but I did try a few things.</li> </ul> <p>What I've tried:</p> <ul> <li>Changed permissions of the AcroRd32.exe to <code>Everyone - Full Control</code>.</li> <li>Output the <code>$?</code> after the <code>system()</code> call. It is <code>1</code>, but I don't know what <code>1</code> means in this case.</li> <li>Verified that there are no <code>disable_functions</code> listed in php (though I think this is unrelated as <code>shell_exec</code> seems to be working, since some of the perl code is ran).</li> <li>Various other configurations that at least got me to the point where I can confirm that PHP is in fact calling the perl script, it just isn't running the <code>system()</code> call.</li> </ul> <p>Other info:</p> <ul> <li>Apache 2.2.1.7</li> <li>PHP 5.35</li> <li>Perl 5.12.3 built for MSWin32-x86-multi-thread</li> <li>WampServer 2.1</li> </ul> <p>I'm at a loss here, and while it seems like this is an Apache / permissions problem, I cannot be sure. My experience with Apache is limited, and most of what I find online is linux commands that don't work in my environment.</p>
 

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