This is good, but I think it can be better (emulate behavior of files with css extension). Normal stylesheets with css extension are automatically checked against request header 'last-modified' date by the webserver for modify and if not return the '304 Not Modified' header saving valuable bandwidth and performance.
However, a file with a php extension won't do this without mucking with the headers. I love the added flexibility of using the php file extension for stylesheets as evidenced by what moodle does in its stylesheets. Certainly makes it much more manageable.
I recently did some work on css cacheing for the seagull app framework with php file extensions and got it working by adapting (and fixing
I think this approach can be used for moodle as well. Basically, the client gets the last-modified timestamp the first time in the header, and on subsequent requests, the styles.php file checks the request header against it's current modified datetime and either sends a new file or sends the '304 Not Modified' header as appropriate.
This could easily be incorporated into the current styles with about 2 lines of code and and an include file (see attached) for each style.
You can validate that it is working with one of the coolest tools I've found in a long time called livehttpdheaders at mozdev (for mozilla). http://livehttpheaders.mozdev.org/
Regards,
John
Here is a sample stylesheet.php use of attached file:
<?php
require_once "css-cache.inc.php";
exitIfCached(getlastmod());
// CSS Substitution Variables
$primary = '#99CC00';
?>
/* stylesheet contents */
body {
margin: 0;
padding: 0;
font-family: "verdana";
font-size: 0.8em;
color: <?php echo "$primary"?>;
}
