The function socket_read() reads from the socket
resource socket created by the
socket_create() or
socket_accept() functions.
socket
length
The maximum number of bytes read is specified by the
length parameter. Otherwise you can use \r, \n,
or \0 to end reading (depending on the type
parameter, see below).
type
Optional type parameter is a named constant:
PHP_BINARY_READ (Default) - use the system recv() function. Safe for reading binary data.
PHP_NORMAL_READ - reading stops at \n or \r.
socket_read() returns the data as a string on success, or FALSE on error (including if the remote host has closed the connection). The error code can be retrieved with socket_last_error(). This code may be passed to socket_strerror() to get a textual representation of the error.
Note: socket_read() returns a zero length string ("") when there is no more data to read.