Sorry, but your problem does not imply a bug in PHP itself.  For a
list of more appropriate places to ask for help using PHP, please
visit http://www.php.net/support.php as this bug system is not the
appropriate forum for asking support questions.  Due to the volume
of reports we can not explain in detail here why your report is not
a bug.  The support channels will be able to provide an explanation
for you.

Thank you for your interest in PHP.

Set your LD_LIBRARY_PATH properly.

I have confirmed this is a IBMIHS (apache2) issue.  I was able to build the PHP tree versus a vanilla apache binary with no errors and full functionality.  The LD_LIBRARY_PATH that is not being set is the one for the 'apachectl start' routine, not for the compilation of PHP.

#export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/local/lib

That's all

# gmake -k install
Installing PHP SAPI module:       apache2handler
/usr/local/buildforge/apache/build/instdso.sh SH_LIBTOOL='/usr/local/buildforge/apache/build/libtool' libphp5.la /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules
rm -f /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.so
/usr/local/buildforge/apache/build/libtool --mode=install cp libphp5.la /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/
cp .libs/libphp5.a /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.a
cp .libs/libphp5.lai /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.la
libtool: install: warning: remember to run `libtool --finish /install/update/php-5.2.6/libs'
chmod 755 /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.so
chmod: /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.so: A file or directory in the path name does not exist.
apxs:Error: Command failed with rc=65536
.
gmake: *** [install-sapi] Error 1
Installing PHP CLI binary:        /usr/local/buildforge/php/bin/
Installing PHP CLI man page:      /usr/local/buildforge/php/man/man1/
Installing shared extensions:     /usr/local/buildforge/php/lib/php/extensions/no-debug-non-zts-20060613/
Installing build environment:     /usr/local/buildforge/php/lib/php/build/
Installing header files:          /usr/local/buildforge/php/include/php/
Installing helper programs:       /usr/local/buildforge/php/bin/
  program: phpize
  program: php-config
Installing man pages:             /usr/local/buildforge/php/man/man1/
  page: phpize.1
  page: php-config.1
Installing PEAR environment:      /usr/local/buildforge/php/lib/php/
[PEAR] PEAR           - already installed: 1.7.1
Wrote PEAR system config file at: /usr/local/buildforge/php/etc/pear.conf
You may want to add: /usr/local/buildforge/php/lib/php to your php.ini include_path
Installing PDO headers:          /usr/local/buildforge/php/include/php/ext/pdo/
gmake: Target `install' not remade because of errors.
# cp .libs/libphp5.a /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.a
# cp .libs/libphp5.lai /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.la
# cp .libs/libphp5.so /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.so
# chmod 755 /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.so
# chmod 755 /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.la
# chmod 755 /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.a
# /usr/local/buildforge/apache/bin/apachectl start
httpd: Syntax error on line 55 of /usr/local/buildforge/apache/conf/httpd.conf: Cannot load /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.so into server: rtld: 0712-001 Symbol xmlTextReaderSetup was referenced\n      from module /usr/local/buildforge/apache/modules/libphp5.so(), but a runtime definition\n      of the symbol was not found.

I'm getting the same error you in the installation of PHP on AIX 5.3. Can you help?

Ah well that never really worked.  What I did was make install with an ignore errors flag, than manually moved the files where they needed to be to prepare for use.  I'll grab my procedure for IBM VAC in the morning and post it.

./configure --with-apxs2=/apps/apache/httpd-2.2.4/bin/apxs --with-libxml-dir=/opt/libxml2/2.6.30 --with-mysql=/opt/mysql/5.0.67 --with-config-file-path=/apps/apache/conf  --enable-maintainer-zts --prefix=/opt/php/5.2.8 --enable-sigchild --with-oci8=/oracle/app/oracle/product/10.2.0
make -i install

cp .libs/libphp5.a /apps/IBMIHS/modules/libphp5.a
cp .libs/libphp5.lai /apps/IBMIHS/modules/libphp5.la
cp -p .libs/libphp5.so /apps/IBMIHS/modules/libphp5.so
chmod 755 /apps/IBMIHS/modules/libphp5.so
libtool --finish /mnt/php/5.2.8/php-5.2.8_webcomm_aix53_src/libs

cd / ; tar -cvf /mnt/php/5.2.8/php-5.2.8_webcomm_aix53.tar ./opt/php ./apps/IBMIHS/modules/libphp* ./apps/IBMIHS/conf/php.ini ; cd -


cp -p ./.libs/libphp5.so /apps/apache/httpd-2.2.4/modules/libphp5.so
chmod 755 /apps/apache/httpd-2.2.4/modules/libphp5.so
libtool --finish /export/packages/php-5.2.8_aix53_src/libs


rc.httpd details:


start_httpd() 
   {
        echo "Starting HTTPD..."
        PID=`cat /apps/apache/logs/httpd.pid 2>/dev/null`
        if ps -ef | grep httpd | grep -v grep | awk {'print "_" $2 "_"'} |  grep "_${PID}_" 1>/dev/null 2>/dev/null
           then
           echo "HTTPD is already running..."
        else
           PRELIB=$LIBPATH
           LIBPATH=/apps/apache/httpd-2.2.4/lib:/opt/libxml2/2.6.30/lib
           export LIBPATH
           /apps/apache/httpd-2.2.4/bin/apachectl start
           LIBPATH=$PRELIB
           export LIBPATH
        fi
}

stop_httpd() 
   {
        # stop daemon
        echo "Stopping HTTPD..."
        PID=`cat /apps/apache/logs/httpd.pid 2>/dev/null`
        if ps -ef | grep httpd | grep -v grep | awk {'print "_" $2 "_"'} |  grep "_${PID}_" 1>/dev/null 2>/dev/null
           then
           PRELIB=$LIBPATH
           LIBPATH=/apps/apache/httpd-2.2.4/lib:/opt/libxml2/2.6.30/lib
           export LIBPATH
           /apps/apache/httpd-2.2.4/bin/apachectl stop
           LIBPATH=$PRELIB
           export LIBPATH
        else
           echo "HTTPD is not running..."
        fi

Had a similar problem on AIX 5.3

PHP compiled (after a day or so of work massaging the various discrepit pieces 
of AIX, including math.h ...) but wouldn't run with the above xmlTextReaderSetup 
error.

After I updated libxml2, it worked fine.  (Googling around says php now needs 
libxml 2.6 or later)

So: get libxml http://www.perzl.org/aix/index.php?n=Main.Libxml2 (I got 2.7.8 
and zlib 1.2.5) and run rpm -Uhv file.rpm on those, and your php binary should 
now work.

Running IHS on AIX 5.3 and ran into errors loading the modules/libphp5.so file. 

I found the best way of handling it was simply to load the libxml2.so.2 in the httpd.conf file before the loading of the php module: LoadFile /usr/installs/libxml2-2.6.30/.libs/libxml2.so.2


My error: 
Syntax error on line 212 of /../../httpd.conf:
Cannot load /../../modules/libphp5.so into server: rtld: 0712-001 Symbol htmlDocDumpMemoryFormat was referenced\n      from modul
e /../../modules/libphp5.so(), but a runtime definition\n      of the symbol was not found.\nrtld: 0712-001 Symbol xmlTextReaderS
etup was referenced\n      from module /../../modules/libphp5.so(), but a runtime definition\n      of the symbol was not found.

I had a old build I had done of php 5.2.17 I was trying to load - and had the same error about 
exec(): 0509-036 Cannot load program /data/prj/php-5.2.17/sapi/cli/php because of the following errors:
rtld: 0712-001 Symbol xmlTextReaderSetup was referenced
      from module php(), but a runtime definition
      of the symbol was not found.

By default, AIX (this time 5.3 TL7) has a libxml2.a in /usr/lib, but this is missing the required routine.

I have a version of libxml2 that can be installed, and this works without any other dependencies (is how I got it working on my test server).

link: http://dl.aixtools.net/tools/aixtools.libxml2.powerpc.2.7.7.I

Note: this puts the library in /opt/lib (not /usr/local/lib) as I am trying to stay away from /usr/local in all my packaging. So, you can try my library, download an RPM from someone else, or build it yourself.

In any case, it is not a bug in php, nor in IHS, nor anything else. It is a requirement for a higher level than installed by default.