Re: php_oci8.dll problem -- Oracle 8 + PHP 5 + (win)Apache

On Wed, 18 Oct 2006 12:46:46 +0300, Janne Lepola <janne.lepola_at_hl-palvelut.fi> wrote:

>I'm running PHP 5.0.4 on Windows Apache and trying to upgrade PHP to run
> on version 5.1.4 or 5.1.6
>
>I installed new version of PHP to new directory (C:\PHP5\), then renamed
>old PHP-directory to PHP-backup , and finally renamed PHP5 directory to
>PHP. Then I manually changed new php.ini to look just like old php.ini
>was (mainly just uncommented OCI8 and GD2 extensions). After restarting
>Apache I got error stating:
>
>"The procedure entry point OCILobRead2 could not be located in the
>dynamic link library OCI.dll"

 PHP's OCI support extension's code has conditional compilation statements so that it can support new features in newer versions of Oracle, or fall back to the previous functionality if compiled against an older version of Oracle.

 OCILobRead2 is a new OCI function introduced in Oracle 10g, which supports access to 10g's larger LOB datatype.

 The newer Windows binary distributions of PHP's OCI8 extension are compiled against the Oracle 10g Instant Client SDK, and as a result, cannot be used against a 9i client, because they try to use this new 10g LOB access function.

 Some choices:

• upgrade your Oracle client (installing 10g Instant Client in particular is quite easy)
• use an older binary version of the OCI8 extension that happens to have been compiled against 9i or is old enough that it only uses functions that exist in both 10g and 9i. Not recommended, since newer versions have fewer bugs, particularly the last couple of versions which had a significant overhaul with some help from Oracle themselves. And you'll also have to find one that's been compiled against the newer PHP extension API.
• compile PHP and the extensions from source using Microsoft Visual Studio, against your 9i client. This is non-trivial - PHP builds easily on UNIX, it's a royal pain on Windows.

-- 
Andy Hassall :: andy@andyh.co.uk :: http://www.andyh.co.uk
http://www.andyhsoftware.co.uk/space :: disk and FTP usage analysis tool