Description:
------------
fopen() can't handle path names like "\\.\pipe\pipename" because the internal function virtual_file_ex() see the ".\" part, thinks that it means current directory, and promptly removes it.

The manual doesn't mention named pipes but I think this is worth fixing as it will give PHP Win32 a robust interprocess communication mechanism that's fairly easy to implement. The fix is easy enough. Insert the following at line 413 in tsrm_virtual_cwd.c, right after the else if (!IS_DIRECTORY_CURRENT(ptr, ptr_length)) loop:

#ifdef TSRM_WIN32
				/* '.' should be retained if the first two chars are '\' as it stands for local machine
				   done mainly for paths to NT named pipes  (\\.\pipe\pipename) */
			} else if(state->cwd_length == 2 && state->cwd[0] == '\\' && state->cwd[1] == '\\') {
				state->cwd = (char *) realloc(state->cwd, state->cwd_length+ptr_length+1);
				memcpy(&state->cwd[state->cwd_length], ptr, ptr_length+1);
				state->cwd_length += ptr_length;
#endif
			}


Reproduce code:
---------------
Set break point at line 1975 in streams.c

fd = open(realpath, open_flags, 0666);

then run <? readfile('\\\\.\\pipe\\pipename'); ?>. Inspect realpath.

Expected result:
----------------
realpath => \\.\pipe\pipename

Actual result:
--------------
realpath => \\pipe\pipename