Check whether image exists on remote URL

curl, image, php, url

Solution

function checkRemoteFile($url)
{
    $ch = curl_init();
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL,$url);
    // don't download content
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_NOBODY, 1);
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_FAILONERROR, 1);
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);

    $result = curl_exec($ch);
    curl_close($ch);
    if($result !== FALSE)
    {
        return true;
    }
    else
    {
        return false;
    }
}

--> that is the fastest way if your host supports curl

Problem

I am generating dynamic URLs of images for book ISBNs. I need a reliable way with PHP to check whether the images actually exist at the remote url. I tried various approaches with different PHP libraries, curl, etc., but none of them works well, some of them are downright slow. Given the fact that I need to generate (and check!) about 60 URLS for each book in my database, this is a huge waiting time. Any clues?

Original source

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