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www.it-ebooks.infoCHAPTER 10 • WORKING WITH THE FILE AND OPERATING SYSTEMAn Alternative to BackticksThe shell_exec() function offers a syntactical alternative to backticks, executing a shell command andreturning the output. Its prototype follows:string shell_exec(string command)Reconsidering the preceding example, this time we’ll use the shell_exec() function instead ofbackticks:SummaryAlthough you can certainly go a very long way using solely PHP to build interesting and powerful webapplications, such capabilities are greatly expanded when functionality is integrated with the underlyingplatform and other technologies. As applied to this chapter, these technologies include the underlyingoperating and file systems. You’ll see this theme repeatedly throughout the remainder of this book.In the next chapter, you’ll be introduced to the PHP Extension and Application Repository (PEAR).255