PHP extension loading from script using dl()

Question

I'm going to buy a (cheap) hosting space with apache/php 5/mysql. Because it's cheap i have no direct control over php.ini and extension loading.

My question is: can i load an extension putting the .dll file into my space and than using dl() php function? Can the host disable this feature thus avoid loading custom extension this way?

Answer 1

Yes, it can be disabled through the enable_dl and safe_mode php.ini settings (which would almost certainly be the case, as otherwise you could e.g. load your own code in the web server process).

And that's in addition to the disable_functions setting, which can disable anything.