php -z does not seem to work at all

[BenMorel]

Description

The examples below use the following test.php script:

<?= extension_loaded('Zend OPcache') ? "OPcache loaded\n" : "OPcache NOT loaded\n";

---

The -d zend_extension option accepts either a file name with or without the .so extension, or an absolute path:

$ php -n -d zend_extension=opcache test.php
OPcache loaded

$ php -n -d zend_extension=opcache.so test.php
OPcache loaded

$ php -n -d zend_extension=/usr/lib/php/20230831/opcache.so test.php
OPcache loaded

The -z option, on the other hand, does not seem to accept a file name:

$ php -n -z opcache test.php
Failed loading opcache:  opcache: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
OPcache NOT loaded

$ php -n -z opcache.so test.php
Failed loading opcache.so:  opcache.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
OPcache NOT loaded

It does not complain when passing an absolute path, but still does not load the extension:

$ php -n -z /usr/lib/php/20230831/opcache.so test.php
OPcache NOT loaded

Furthermore, its behaviour becomes really strange when you specify both -d zend_extension and -z:

$ php -n -d zend_extension=opcache -z opcache test.php
Failed loading opcache:  opcache: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
OPcache loaded

$ php -n -d zend_extension=opcache.so -z opcache.so test.php
Cannot load Zend OPcache - it was already loaded
OPcache loaded

$ php -n -d zend_extension=/usr/lib/php/20230831/opcache.so -z /usr/lib/php/20230831/opcache.so test.php
Cannot load Zend OPcache - it was already loaded
OPcache loaded

In the last 2 runs, it now says that the extension was already loaded, even though specifying -z alone did not load the extension.

Is the -z argument broken? Should it be removed from php, as it's redundant with -d zend_extension anyway?

PHP Version

PHP 8.1, 8.2, 8.3, 8.4

Operating System

Ubuntu 24.04

[nielsdos]

So the extension gets loaded but it's never registered in the module registry strangely, and so never initialized either...

[nielsdos]

Oh this happens because parsing the -z argument happens in do_cli that happens after module_startup, which is too late.

[nielsdos]

Very dirty workaround PoC that demonstrates this is indeed the problem: https://gist.github.com/nielsdos/52fcc29433d568dd41399ad0c916b129
Question is how to do this cleanly without breaking ABI either...

Another idea is to use the ini builder, which is cleaner, but I wonder how that interacts with escape chars etc...:

diff --git a/sapi/cli/php_cli.c b/sapi/cli/php_cli.c
index 64fb9c5c515..31c96869ea4 100644
--- a/sapi/cli/php_cli.c
+++ b/sapi/cli/php_cli.c
@@ -819,9 +819,6 @@ static int do_cli(int argc, char **argv) /* {{{ */
 				behavior=PHP_MODE_STRIP;
 				break;
 
-			case 'z': /* load extension file */
-				zend_load_extension(php_optarg);
-				break;
 			case 'H':
 				hide_argv = true;
 				break;
@@ -1283,6 +1280,9 @@ int main(int argc, char *argv[])
 			case 'e': /* enable extended info output */
 				use_extended_info = 1;
 				break;
+			case 'z': /* load extension file */
+				php_ini_builder_quoted(&ini_builder, ZEND_STRL("zend_extension"), php_optarg, strlen(php_optarg));
+				break;
 		}
 	}
 exit_loop:

[BenMorel]

@nielsdos Shouldn’t -z be removed altogether?

Looks like nobody is relying on it, and there is already an alternative with -d, making it redundant.