<reference id="ref.outcontrol">
  <title>Output Control Functions</title>
  <titleabbrev>Output Control</titleabbrev>

  <partintro>
   <para>
    The Output Control functions allow you to control when output is
    sent from the script.  This can be useful in several different
    situations, especially if you need to send headers to the browser
    after your script has began outputing data.  The Output Control
    functions do not affect headers sent using
    <function>header</function> or <function>setcookie</function>,
    only functions such as <function>echo</function> and data between
    blocks of PHP code.
   </para>
   <para>
    <example>
     <title>Output Control example</title>
     <programlisting role="php">
&lt;?php

ob_start();
echo "Hello\n";

setcookie ("cookiename", "cookiedata");

ob_end_flush();

?&gt;
     </programlisting>
    </example>
   </para>
   <para>
    In the above example, the output from <function>echo</function>
    would be stored in the output buffer until
    <function>ob_end_flush</function> was called.  In the mean time,
    the call to <function>setcookie</function> successfully stored a
    cookie without causing an error. (You can not normally send
    headers to the browser after data has already been sent.)
   </para>
   <para>
    See also <function>header</function> and
    <function>setcookie</function>.
   </para>
  </partintro>

  <refentry id="function.flush">
   <refnamediv>
    <refname>flush</refname> 
    <refpurpose>Flush the output buffer</refpurpose>
   </refnamediv>
   <refsect1>
    <title>Description</title>
    <funcsynopsis>
     <funcprototype>
      <funcdef>void <function>flush</function></funcdef>
      <void/>
     </funcprototype>
    </funcsynopsis>
    <simpara>
     Flushes the output buffers of PHP and whatever backend PHP is
     using (CGI, a web server, etc.)  This effectively tries to push
     all the output so far to the user's browser.
    </simpara>
   </refsect1>
  </refentry>

  <refentry id="function.ob-start">
   <refnamediv>
    <refname>ob_start</refname> 
    <refpurpose>Turn on output buffering</refpurpose>
   </refnamediv>
   <refsect1>
    <title>Description</title>
    <funcsynopsis>
     <funcprototype>
      <funcdef>void <function>ob_start</function></funcdef>
      <void/>
     </funcprototype>
    </funcsynopsis>
    <para>
     This function will turn output buffering on. While output buffering
     is active no output is sent from the script, instead the output
     is stored in an internal buffer.
    </para>
    <para>
     The contents of this internal buffer may be copied into a string
     variable using <function>ob_get_contents</function>.  To output
     what is stored in the internal buffer, use
     <function>ob_end_flush</function>.  Alternatively,
     <function>ob_end_clean</function> will silently discard the
     buffer contents.
    </para>
    <para>
     See also <function>ob_get_contents</function>,
     <function>ob_end_flush</function>,
     <function>ob_end_clean</function>, and
     <function>ob_implicit_flush</function>
    </para>
   </refsect1>
  </refentry>
 
  <refentry id="function.ob-get-contents">
   <refnamediv>
    <refname>ob_get_contents</refname> 
    <refpurpose>
     Return the contents of the output buffer
    </refpurpose>
   </refnamediv>
   <refsect1>
    <title>Description</title>
    <funcsynopsis>
     <funcprototype>
      <funcdef>string <function>ob_get_contents</function></funcdef>
      <void/>
     </funcprototype>
    </funcsynopsis>
    <para>
     This will return the contents of the output buffer or FALSE, if
     output buffering isn't active.
    </para>
    <para>
     See also <function>ob_start</function> and
     <function>ob_get_length</function>.
    </para>
   </refsect1>
  </refentry>

  <refentry id="function.ob-get-length">
   <refnamediv>
    <refname>ob_get_length</refname>
    <refpurpose>
     Return the length of the output buffer
    </refpurpose>
   </refnamediv>
   <refsect1>
    <title>Description</title>
    <funcsynopsis>
     <funcprototype>
      <funcdef>string <function>ob_get_length</function></funcdef>
      <void/>
     </funcprototype>
    </funcsynopsis>
    <para>
     This will return the length of the contents in the output buffer
     or FALSE, if output buffering isnt't active.
    </para>
    <para>
     See also <function>ob_start</function> and
     <function>ob_get_contents</function>.
    </para>
   </refsect1>
  </refentry>
 
  <refentry id="function.ob-end-flush">
   <refnamediv>
    <refname>ob_end_flush</refname> 
    <refpurpose>
     Flush (send) the output buffer and turn off output buffering    
    </refpurpose>
   </refnamediv>
   <refsect1>
    <title>Description</title>
    <funcsynopsis>
     <funcprototype>
      <funcdef>void <function>ob_end_flush</function></funcdef>
      <void/>
     </funcprototype>
    </funcsynopsis>
    <para>
     This function will send the contents of the output buffer (if
     any) and turn output buffering off.  If you want to further
     process the buffer's contents you have to call
     <function>ob_get_contents</function> before
     <function>ob_end_flush</function> as the buffer contents are
     discarded after <function>ob_get_contents</function> is called.
    </para>
    <para>
     See also <function>ob_start</function>,
     <function>ob_get_contents</function>, and
     <function>ob_end_clean</function>.
    </para>
   </refsect1>
  </refentry>
 
  <refentry id="function.ob-end-clean">
   <refnamediv>
    <refname>ob_end_clean</refname> 
    <refpurpose>
     Clean (erase) the output buffer and turn off output buffering
    </refpurpose>
   </refnamediv>
   <refsect1>
    <title>Description</title>
    <funcsynopsis>
     <funcprototype>
      <funcdef>void <function>ob_end_clean</function></funcdef>
      <void/>
     </funcprototype>
    </funcsynopsis>
    <para>
     This function discards the contents of the output buffer and
     turns off output buffering.
    </para>
    <para>
     See also <function>ob_start</function> and
     <function>ob_end_flush</function>.
    </para>
   </refsect1>
  </refentry>
 
  <refentry id="function.ob-implicit-flush">
   <refnamediv>
    <refname>ob_implicit_flush</refname> 
    <refpurpose>
     Turn implicit flush on/off 
    </refpurpose>
   </refnamediv>
   <refsect1>
    <title>Description</title>
    <funcsynopsis>
     <funcprototype>
      <funcdef>void <function>ob_implicit_flush</function></funcdef>
      <paramdef>int 
       <parameter><optional>flag</optional></parameter>
      </paramdef>		  
     </funcprototype>
    </funcsynopsis>
    <para>
     <function>ob_implicit_flush</function> will turn implicit
     flushing on or off (if no <parameter>flag</parameter> is given,
     it defaults to on).  Implicit flushing will result in a flush
     operation after every output call, so that explicit calls to
     <function>flush</function> will no longer be needed.
    </para>
    <para>
     Turning implicit flushing on will disable output buffering, the
     output buffers current output will be sent as if
     <function>ob_end_flush</function> had been called.
    </para>
    <para>
     See also <function>flush</function>,
     <function>ob_start</function>, and
     <function>ob_end_flush</function>.
    </para>
   </refsect1>
  </refentry>

 </reference>

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