Consider deprecating HTTP_ vars.

[Poikilos]

I'll add some issues in case there are minor improvements, or issues that usage may uncover later, in the code I've seen.

Currently, the codebase sets the deprecated vars:

// PHP5 with register_long_arrays off?
if (@phpversion() >= '5.0.0' && (!@ini_get('register_long_arrays') || @ini_get('register_long_arrays') == '0' || strtolower(@ini_get('register_long_arrays')) == 'off'))
{
    $HTTP_POST_VARS = $_POST;
    $HTTP_GET_VARS = $_GET;
    $HTTP_SERVER_VARS = $_SERVER;
    $HTTP_COOKIE_VARS = $_COOKIE;
    $HTTP_ENV_VARS = $_ENV;
    $HTTP_POST_FILES = $_FILES;

    // _SESSION is the only superglobal which is conditionally set
    if (isset($_SESSION))
    {
        $HTTP_SESSION_VARS = $_SESSION;
    }
}

Maybe just use the new vars instead.

[bjorn]

This mostly affects the old phpBB2 code. Since we don't expect to ever update that again, a search & replace for these variables seems appropriate.

[Poikilos]

For reference, maybe use:

find ./ -name "*.php" -exec sed -i 's/\$HTTP_POST_VARS/\$_POST/g' {} \;
find ./ -name "*.php" -exec sed -i 's/\$HTTP_GET_VARS/\$_GET/g' {} \;
find ./ -name "*.php" -exec sed -i 's/\$HTTP_SESSION_VARS/\$_SESSION/g' {} \;
find ./ -name "*.php" -exec sed -i 's/\$HTTP_COOKIE_VARS/\$_COOKIE/g' {} \;
find ./ -name "*.php" -exec sed -i 's/\$HTTP_ENV_VARS/\$_ENV/g' {} \;
find ./ -name "*.php" -exec sed -i 's/\$HTTP_SERVER_VARS/\$_SERVER/g' {} \;
find ./ -name "*.php" -exec sed -i 's/\$HTTP_POST_FILES/\$_FILES/g' {} \;

from https://forum.directadmin.com/threads/multiple-php-versions.41451/#post-209294