I have a script that runs periodically by a launchd timer. I give the script a very tight timeout ( set_time_limit(120); ).

Most of the time, my script works great. But every once in a while, one of the commands I run in an exec( ) call seems to hang. This of course is a problem because once the exec( ) call hangs, the php script hangs as time spent on exec( ) calls does not count towards the script's runtime.

Furthermore since the script is still running, launchd doesn't call it again. So in this way, my script is entirely at the mercy of a command line program not having a problem. And if it does, I can't do anything about it.

So while I could try to figure out why my particular command seems to go awry (which is its own weird issues), the bigger issue is how can I call command line programs in php in a way that don't allow a runaway command to lock up the whole script? I wish there was an exec( )-type function with timeout built in. Or even a script timelimit function that DID count pauses and external programs. Something to kill this!? Something other than a SECOND php script that would check on the first script and kill it when there is a problem. There MUST be a better solution than that?