Get parent directory of running script

Question

In PHP, what would be the cleanest way to get the parent directory of the current running script relative to the www root? Assume I have:

$_         


        

Answer 1

Here is what I use since I am not running > 5.2

function getCurrentOrParentDirectory($type='current')
{
    if ($type == 'current') {
        $path = dirname(__FILE__);  
    } else {
        $path = dirname(dirname(__FILE__));
    }
    $position = strrpos($path, '/') + 1;
    return substr($path, $position);
}

Double dirname with file as suggested by @mike b for the parent directory, and current directory is found by just using that syntax once.

Note this function only returns the NAME, slashes have to be added afterwards.

Answer 2

Got it myself, it's a bit kludgy but it works:

substr(dirname($_SERVER['SCRIPT_NAME']), 0, strrpos(dirname($_SERVER['SCRIPT_NAME']), '/') + 1)

So if I have /path/to/folder/index.php, this results in /path/to/.

Answer 3

If your script is located in /var/www/dir/index.php then the following would return:

dirname(__FILE__); // /var/www/dir

or

dirname( dirname(__FILE__) ); // /var/www

---

Edit

This is a technique used in many frameworks to determine relative paths from the app_root.

File structure:

 /var/
      www/
          index.php
          subdir/
                 library.php

index.php is my dispatcher/boostrap file that all requests are routed to:

define(ROOT_PATH, dirname(__FILE__) ); // /var/www

library.php is some file located an extra directory down and I need to determine the path relative to the app root (/var/www/).

$path_current = dirname( __FILE__ ); // /var/www/subdir
$path_relative = str_replace(ROOT_PATH, '', $path_current); // /subdir

There's probably a better way to calculate the relative path then str_replace() but you get the idea.

Answer 4

If I properly understood your question, supposing your running script is

/relative/path/to/script/index.php

This would give you the parent directory of your running script relative to the document www:

$parent_dir = dirname(dirname($_SERVER['SCRIPT_NAME'])) . '/';
//$parent_dir will be '/relative/path/to/'

If you want the parent directory of your running script relative to server root:

$parent_dir = dirname(dirname($_SERVER['SCRIPT_FILENAME'])) . '/';
//$parent_dir will be '/root/some/path/relative/path/to/'

Answer 5

This is a function that I use. Created it once so I always have this functionality:

function getDir(){
    $directory = dirname(__FILE__);
    $directory = explode("/",$directory);
    $findTarget = 0;
    $targetPath = "";
    foreach($directory as $dir){
        if($findTarget == 1){
            $targetPath = "".$targetPath."/".$dir."";
        }
        if($dir == "public_html"){
            $findTarget = 1;
        }
    }
    return "http://www.".$_SERVER['SERVER_NAME']."".$targetPath."";
}

Answer 6

Fugly, but this will do it:

substr($_SERVER['SCRIPT_NAME'], 0, strpos($_SERVER['SCRIPT_NAME'],basename($_SERVER['SCRIPT_NAME'])))