How to catch timeout errors and continue?

[jimbean]

Hi!

My PHP script connects to a server to get a html page. Something like this:

$url ="http:://www.aaa.com/....";
set_time_limit(30); //30 seconds for each page
$html = file_get_contents($url);

The problem is: I want to set a reasonable time limit, and , if the server does not respond during this time, I want to CONTINUE execution of the script.

I tried to write my own error handler and called set_error_handler. The problem is that FATAL errors (timeout is a fatal error) cannot be caught with custom error handler (not in PHP 4.3.x at least).
So the script just dies, wich is uunacceptable. I just want to display a message that timeout has occured and continue execution.

Any idea how to do that?
I don't have access to the php.ini (since the script will be hosted).

Thanks in advance

[Daimaju]

you could try to use cURL
if your host has it installed/enabled

[sonicgroup]

Rather than using file_get_contents, you may want to look into using fopen() or fsockopen() with stream_set_timeout().