Handle

A handle, in PHP jargon, represents a datastructure that has established a link with an independant resource. There are handles for files, for database connexion, for http connexions, etc.

The content of the handle is usually opaque: there is no need to know what is inside, except that this handle must be provided to every function call.

Handles are often build with the type resource, and they are evolving toward objects. The content is still opaque, but the objects carry the dataset between method calls.

<?php

$handle = fopen(c:\\folder\\resource.txt, r);
$string = fread($handle);
fclose($handle);

?>