<p>How fast is <a href="http://php.net/manual/en/function.php-uname.php" rel="nofollow noreferrer">php_uname()</a> say doing <code>php_uname('s n')</code> or <code>php_uname('a')</code>. The reason I ask is because I'd like to use it to determine which server I'm on and therefore the configuration (paths, etc).</p>

<p>This is related to <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/211885/is-there-a-php-function-or-variable-giving-the-local-host-name">Is there a PHP function or variable giving the local host name?</a></p>

I just did this:
```
```
<?php
  $tstart = microtime(true);

  php_uname('a');

  print 'it took '. sprintf("%f",microtime(true) - $tstart) ." seconds\n";
?>
```
```
And it produced this:
```
```
it took 0.000016 seconds
```
```
That is on a Core2Duo 2.4GHz Debian box.
I know it is an empirical test and all but I think that it shows that it will be fast enough for you.
I did not expect it to take a long time since uname only needs to make a very simple call to the kernel.