In the first part of the chapter, we looked at PHP's in-built functions for manipulating files and directories in the server's file system. We also covered another useful feature of PHP, which is the functionality for uploading files from web browsers.
In the second part of the chapter, we went on to implement a simple practical example using the file and directory functions available in PHP. We could go on and develop a whole host of applications, much more complex than we saw above, but the basic functions remain the same. Other possible applications using PHP's file and directory API include:
Web based file explorers
Providing a web-based interface for accessing the local file system of the server machine
Web-based e-mail server
Implementing a web-based e-mail server, which uses the server's file system for storing e-mails
Enhancing the online storage application to support sharing of folders among users