"Multithreaded" PHP

[krusty_ar]

Hi, I have a php script that I run in apache2 (with PHP 4.3.3). The script takes a long time to complete, but each work unit can be done in parallel without problems and the task is not CPU bounded, so my idea was to invoke the script in several browser windows and use a marker in the db so each script processes the next free work unit, the thing is, when I run a second browser, it waits for the previous to finish and then starts running. Is there a way to avoid this without being forced to run other copies from different boxes', I don't even know what is the criteria to determine when to wait or not (IP, domain, etc).

The function that I'm interested in parallelizing is @fsockopen.

Maybe this has something to do: I'm flushing the page with status updates.

Do you have any suggestions on how to make this work or know why is this happening?
_________________
I am Beta, don't expect correct behaviour from me.
Take part of the adopt an unaswered post initiative

[orionrobots]

Spawning/forking or executing a seperate script/program. A PHP script can use exec to run external points.

With PHP shell scripting, you may still work with PHP(as that is what you are comfortable with), in such a way that you may kick off a large task in a browser window, but not need to keep that window open to continue the task. You would then output the data to a log, and have a URL which displays the output. You could even have the script email its log to the user.

Try something like this:

[krusty_ar]

Thanks, I'll give it a try and post the results here
_________________
I am Beta, don't expect correct behaviour from me.
Take part of the adopt an unaswered post initiative