When you use fsockopen with allow_call_time_pass_reference = Off in the php.ini, there's an error message that this feature won't be supported in future versions any more and that the declaration of fsockopen should be changed. The other way round, the manual says: "Note that the errno and errstr arguments must be passed by reference."

So, the declaration of fsockopen should be changed in future versions to:
int fsockopen (string [udp://]hostname, int port [, int &errno [, string &errstr [, double timeout]]])
   

Regards

Jean-Pierre Bergamin
http://www.ractive.ch