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How do you run a PHP script from the command line, and how does this differ from running PHP through a web server? How does the getopt function provide a more structured way to parse command line options and flags compared to manually processing the $argv array? How do PHP frameworks like Laravel's Artisan or Symfony's Console component let you build well structured, reusable custom command line commands? How do you schedule a PHP script to run automatically at regular intervals using cron on a Linux server? How should a long running PHP CLI script, such as a queue worker, handle graceful shutdown when it receives a termination signal from the operating system? What memory management considerations apply specifically to long running PHP CLI scripts, such as queue workers, that might process thousands of jobs without ever restarting?
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How do you access command line arguments passed to a PHP script using the $argv and $argc superglobals?

Beginner

Answer

The $argv superglobal is an array containing every argument passed to the script from the command line, with the first element always being the script's own file name, and $argc contains the total count of those arguments, together letting your script read and respond to whatever specific arguments were provided when it was invoked, similar to how a web script reads data from $_GET or $_POST.
// Running: php greet.php Ali
echo "Script name: $argv[0]";
echo "First argument: $argv[1]";
echo "Total arguments: $argc";
Real-world example A backup script reads the target directory to back up directly from a command line argument, letting the same script be reused flexibly for different directories simply by changing the argument provided each time it is run.

Common follow-ups: How do you provide default values for optional command line arguments that were not supplied?;What is the difference between $argv and using PHP's more structured getopt function?

Functions & Scope;File Handling & File System Functions
All 7 PHP CLI Scripting questions