Actually. enabling parse_ini_files is the best way anyway.

@PhilETaylor Since #15620 was supposed to fix this on those less-than-optimal-hosts, do you have a clue why it could still fail?

After that PR we should call back to the old way of doing things (pre 3.7.0) when the function isn't enabled. So we need to figure out exactly what's changed for you.

I had a similar problem in my plugins - resolved by replacing _QQ_ with \ ". See backbutton/content-plugin#9

Please run and show us the result. Thanks

<?php
if (function_exists('parse_ini_file'))
{
	echo 'parse_ini_file';
}
else
{
	echo 'parse_ini_string';
}

echo '<br>';
echo 'The current PHP Version is ' . phpversion();

parse_ini_file
The current PHP Version is 5.6.31

I can change the PHP version from cpanel and test with different php versions if necessary?

hmm this mean the php feature is implemented but failing.. Can you reproduce this using a core only install on the same webserver?

@zero-24 thank you very much for your support. I have done it recently and it was a fresh installation and it was like this again. I will do it right now once again and inform you about the issue. I will test it with different php versions as well.

Fresh installation, first moment of truth:

Aha! Second moment of truth: With PHP version 7.1. Surprise:

It is good with PHP 7.0 as well. Good to know. But still, it would be nice to publish a fix for lower PHP versions.

I did have just tested 5.5.38 & 5.6.30 and I can not reproduce the issue. Can you please double check the results of the script above per PHP Version?

Please also try the following changes...
https://github.com/joomla/joomla-cms/compare/staging...zero-24:parseinifile?expand=1
... and tell me if that helps.

parse_ini_string
The current PHP Version is 5.2.17

parse_ini_string
The current PHP Version is 5.3.29

parse_ini_string
The current PHP Version is 5.4.45

parse_ini_string
The current PHP Version is 5.5.38

parse_ini_file
The current PHP Version is 5.6.31 (I think this was default on server)

parse_ini_string
The current PHP Version is 7.0.21

parse_ini_string
The current PHP Version is 7.1.7

So how is this possible @zero-24 ?

This depends on your server setup. Please check the patch i have linked above.

What language is that? It may be an error in the language pack?

Turkish

Even if it would be a broken language. The fallback should be parse_ini_string ;)

I will check the patch in the morning because the hosting company changed the current settings and left because of their working hours. I will have those changes reverted tomorrow.

In the meanwhile, I would like to share this with you, that I have found in PHP manual:

A function name may exist even if the function itself is unusable due to configuration or compiling options (with the image functions being an example).

As far as I understand now, the function exists but is not allowed due to default server settings (PHP 5.6 is default). So Joomla sees that parse_ini_file exists but it is not allowed actually so it does not fall back to parse_ini_string.

Sounds like that. So please check the patch i have provided above. Thanks.

Unfortunately the patch did not work. The issue is still the same as above. If the parse_ini_file function exists but not allowed, the language strings are not parsed. If the parse_ini_file function does not exist (as in the other versions except PHP 5.6 here) it works fine. I think it falls back to parse_ini_string then.

So what do you recommend in this case? I can talk with my hosting company and ask them to remove this function from default settings so that I don't suffer any more or the developers propose us another way something like this:

if (function_exists('parse_ini_file') && (function_enabled('parse_ini_file')){}

Of course, function_enabled is something I made up. :-)

So as a result, if I prefer to setup Joomla with PHP 7.0 and above, I don't have any problems. I can personally solve the problem. But I still believe that Joomla should modify the code so that when parse_ini_file exists but is not enabled the code should be able to work.

Very big thank you to all, who helped me to understand what was going on. Especially to @zero-24

@hakanara how about a try catch for the function_enabled ?

Is there a significant page loading difference when parse_ini_file or parse_ini_string used when parsing the language strings are parsed? Which is better, can anybody tell me please?

Please check with your hosting if they use the 'suhosin' extension to disable that function.

<?php
$disabled_functions = explode(',', ini_get('disable_functions'));
$is_parse_ini_file_enabled = !in_array('parse_ini_file', $disabled_functions);
if (function_exists('parse_ini_file') && $is_parse_ini_file_enabled) {
        echo 'parse_ini_file';
} else {
        echo 'parse_ini_string';
}

echo '<br>'; echo 'The current PHP Version is ' . phpversion();

What happens if you run this on the same hosts?

I was asking for suhosin because of this: http://php.net/manual/de/function.function-exists.php#77980 as based on that comment

If you use suhosin.executor.func.blacklist instead of disabled_functions in your php.ini, function_exists will return true for a disabled function.

@wilsonge Did it work? If I run this script it says:

parse_ini_file
The current PHP Version is 5.6.31

And @zero-24 , the hosting company says that they do not use any extension to disable the function. They disable it via php.ini. This is the answer they gave me.

I updated my comment above. I think it didn't work. It still see parse_ini_file (and this function is not enabled) with the code @wilsonge sent me.

They disable it via php.ini. This is the answer they gave me.

hmm. but this is exactly that what @wilsonge tested by manually checking ini_get('disable_functions') As well as function_exists should do this too.

Does it mean they have changed some settings in between the messages. This is possible because I also contacted the housing company after I opened the issue. Do you want me to retest something else?

Hmm if possible can you share this issue with them and ask them to share the exact way how we should detect that the feature is disabled?

When I'm back to my PC tomorrow i can also build a script to test the suhosin extension just to be sure.

So here is the script:

$func = 'parse_ini_file';

if (extension_loaded('suhosin'))
{
        $suhosin = @ini_get("suhosin.executor.func.blacklist");

        if (empty($suhosin) == false)
        {
            $suhosin = explode(',', $suhosin);
            $suhosin = array_map('trim', $suhosin);
            $suhosin = array_map('strtolower', $suhosin);
            $result = array_search($func, $suhosin);

            if ($result === false)
            {
                echo 'disabled by suhosin';
            }
        }
    }
}
else
{
echo 'suhosin is not installed';
}
echo '<br>';
echo phpversion();

Thank you very much. There was an extra bracket in the script, I removed it and then the code worked. The result is:
suhosin is not installed
7.1.7

The same for 5.6.31 as well.

So here is the translated answer of the hosting company about disabling the function:
You can diplay all the disabled functions via this link:
http://lcpr01.vargonen.net/info.php

These functions are disabled by writing "disable_functions=apache_child_terminate, apache_setenv, parse_ini_file" on php.ini file. There isn't any extensions or addons to disable these functions.

<?php
$disabled_functions = explode(',', ini_get('disable_functions'));
var_dump($disabled_functions);

So if you run this on your server what's the result?

array(84) { [0]=> string(22) "apache_child_terminate" [1]=> string(14) " apache_setenv" [2]=> string(24) " define_syslog_variables" [3]=> string(15) " escapeshellarg" [4]=> string(15) " escapeshellcmd" [5]=> string(5) " eval" [6]=> string(5) " exec" [7]=> string(3) " fp" [8]=> string(5) " fput" [9]=> string(9) " ftp_exec" [10]=> string(15) " highlight_file" [11]=> string(10) " ini_alter" [12]=> string(12) " ini_restore" [13]=> string(12) " inject_code" [14]=> string(8) " openlog" [15]=> string(9) " passthru" [16]=> string(10) " php_uname" [17]=> string(18) " phpAds_remoteInfo" [18]=> string(14) " phpAds_XmlRpc" [19]=> string(20) " phpAds_xmlrpcDecode" [20]=> string(20) " phpAds_xmlrpcEncode" [21]=> string(6) " popen" [22]=> string(11) " posix_kill" [23]=> string(13) " posix_mkfifo" [24]=> string(14) " posix_setpgid" [25]=> string(13) " posix_setsid" [26]=> string(13) " posix_setuid" [27]=> string(13) " posix_setuid" [28]=> string(12) " posix_uname" [29]=> string(11) " proc_close" [30]=> string(16) " proc_get_status" [31]=> string(10) " proc_nice" [32]=> string(10) " proc_open" [33]=> string(15) " proc_terminate" [34]=> string(11) " shell_exec" [35]=> string(7) " syslog" [36]=> string(7) " system" [37]=> string(21) " xmlrpc_entity_decode" [38]=> string(12) " show_source" [39]=> string(8) " symlink" [40]=> string(5) " mail" [41]=> string(8) " foreach" [42]=> string(12) " openbasedir" [43]=> string(7) " f_open" [44]=> string(3) " dl" [45]=> string(4) " cat" [46]=> string(15) " mysql_list_dbs" [47]=> string(17) " get_current_user" [48]=> string(9) " getmyuid" [49]=> string(9) " pconnect" [50]=> string(5) " link" [51]=> string(4) " fin" [52]=> string(13) " passthruexec" [53]=> string(9) " fileread" [54]=> string(11) " pcntl_exec" [55]=> string(15) " parse_ini_file" [56]=> string(5) " leak" [57]=> string(6) " chown" [58]=> string(16) " allow_url_fopen" [59]=> string(10) " fpassthru" [60]=> string(8) " execute" [61]=> string(6) " shell" [62]=> string(6) " chgrp" [63]=> string(14) " stream_select" [64]=> string(14) " socket_select" [65]=> string(14) " socket_create" [66]=> string(21) " socket_create_listen" [67]=> string(19) " socket_create_pair" [68]=> string(14) " socket_listen" [69]=> string(14) " socket_accept" [70]=> string(12) " socket_bind" [71]=> string(16) " socket_strerror" [72]=> string(11) " pcntl_fork" [73]=> string(13) " pcntl_signal" [74]=> string(14) " pcntl_waitpid" [75]=> string(18) " pcntl_wexitstatus" [76]=> string(16) " pcntl_wifexited" [77]=> string(18) " pcntl_wifsignaled" [78]=> string(17) " pcntl_wifstopped" [79]=> string(15) " pcntl_wstopsig" [80]=> string(15) " pcntl_wtermsig" [81]=> string(19) " apache_get_version" [82]=> string(14) " apache_getenv" [83]=> string(12) " apache_note" }

I am not a PHP guru, but just a learner. But as far as I understand, this part behaves strange:
This part returns 1 but it should return 0 right?
echo !in_array('parse_ini_file', $disabled_functions);

Because of the space at the begining of "parse_ini_file" string in the array, we can't match. It should be like " parse_ini_file" Is that right?

!in_array('parse_ini_file', array_map('trim', $disabled_functions));
What if we do this then. But yes looks like that's probably the issue

I will check it tomorrow. Why don't you simply search the string within the string without turning it into an array?

@wilsonge I have tried the last one you gave me and this time it returns empty value. It means it is working now. Without trimming it was giving 1 which was wrong. (which meant that the function did not exist in the array even though it existed)

So I have a question now, why dont you search the function name "parse_ini_file" within ini_get("disable_functions") without turning it into an array? Is it faster this way when it is an array?

Or without trimming you can implode the array as
$disabled_functions = explode(', ', ini_get('disable_functions'));

with a space right after the comma. Then there will be no need for trimming.

$disabled_functions = explode(', ', ini_get('disable_functions'));

The problem with that is that some hosts won't have spaces after the commas :) and then for them it will fail to explode

But is not the extra space a problem of the hoster? Or is this common? As function_exists should handle that ini setting already.

It's probably a hosting problem (or maybe it's a PHP problem?? I don't know why PHP wouldn't trim internally). But it's very easy for us to work around. See #17332

@wilsonge and @zero-24 Thank you very much for all your efforts.

Can you mark a test on the PR in the issue tracker please https://issues.joomla.org/tracker/joomla-cms/17332