# dba_open

(PHP 4, PHP 5)

dba_open — Open database

### Description

resource dba_open ( string `$path` , string `$mode` [, string `$handler` [, mixed `$...` ]] )

dba_open() establishes a database instance for `path` with `mode` using `handler` .

### Parameters

`path`

  Commonly a regular path in your filesystem.

`mode`

  It is r for read access, w for read/write access to an already existing database, c for read/write access and database creation if it doesn't currently exist, and n for create, truncate and read/write access.

  Additionally you can set the database lock method with the next char. Use l to lock the database with a .lck file or d to lock the databasefile itself. It is important that all of your applications do this consistently.

  If you want to test the access and do not want to wait for the lock you can add t as third character. When you are absolutely sure that you do not require database locking you can do so by using - instead of l or d. When none of d, l or - is used, dba will lock on the database file as it would with d.

  > Note: There can only be one writer for one database file. When you use dba on a web server and more than one request requires write operations they can only be done one after another. Also read during write is not allowed. The dba extension uses locks to prevent this. See the following table:

  > DBA locking
  > already open | `mode` = "rl" | `mode` = "rlt" | `mode` = "wl" | `mode` = "wlt" | `mode` = "rd" | `mode` = "rdt" | `mode` = "wd" | `mode` = "wdt"
  > --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | ---
  > not open | ok | ok | ok | ok | ok | ok | ok | ok
  > `mode` = "rl" | ok | ok | wait | false | illegal | illegal | illegal | illegal
  > `mode` = "wl" | wait | false | wait | false | illegal | illegal | illegal | illegal
  > `mode` = "rd" | illegal | illegal | illegal | illegal | ok | ok | wait | false
  > `mode` = "wd" | illegal | illegal | illegal | illegal | wait | false | wait | false

  > - ok: the second call will be successfull.
  > - wait: the second call waits until dba_close() is called for the first.
  > - false: the second call returns false.
  > - illegal: you must not mix "l" and "d" modifiers for `mode` parameter.

`handler`

  The name of the handler which shall be used for accessing `path` . It is passed all optional parameters given to dba_open() and can act on behalf of them.

### Return Values

Returns a positive handle on success, or `FALSE` on failure.

### ChangeLog

Version | Description
--- | ---
4.3.0 | It's possible to open database files over network connection. However in cases a socket connection will be used (as with http or ftp) the connection will be locked instead of the resource itself. This is important to know since in such cases locking is simply ignored on the resource and other solutions have to be found.
4.3.0 | Locking and the `mode` modifiers "l", "d", "-" and "t" were added. In previous PHP versions, you must use semaphores to guard against simultaneous database access for any database handler with the exception of GDBM. See System V semaphore support.
before 4.3.5 | open mode 'c' is broken for several internal handlers and truncates the database instead of appending data to an existent database. Also dbm and ndbm fail on mode 'c' in typical configurations (this cannot be fixed).

### See Also

- dba_popen()
- dba_close()