At http://ca2.php.net/features.commandline it says this:

" There are certain php.ini directives which are overriden by the CLI SAPI because they do not make sense in shell environments: "

Then it lists the overriden php.ini directives, which includes inplicit_flush, defaulting it to true.


So theoretically, CLI shouldn't buffer.  This is true with the RC releases of 4.3.2, but with the final release, it BUFFERS!
And I mean it really buffers.  I tried flush() and ob_implicit_flush();, but it still only outputs at the end of the script.  Here is a sample script:

<?php
echo 'This should be printed immediately.';
sleep(5);
?>

When executing this script at the command line, it outputs "This should be printed immediately." after a wait of 5 seconds.  This tells us that it is buffering.

I hope someone would email me if this program acts differently on their computer, or if the bug is fixed.  My email is jkitching@mailbolt.com