What are some alternative approaches to checking file deletability in PHP, aside from using is_writable and @ suppression?

The issue with using is_writable and @ suppression to check file deletability in PHP is that it may not accurately determine if a file can be deleted due to various factors such as file permissions or open file handles. An alternative approach is to use the file_exists and is_file functions in combination with the unlink function to safely attempt to delete a file. 

$file_path = 'path/to/file.txt';

if (file_exists($file_path) && is_file($file_path)) {
    if (unlink($file_path)) {
        echo 'File deleted successfully';
    } else {
        echo 'Unable to delete file';
    }
} else {
    echo 'File does not exist or is not a regular file';
}

Keywords

file permissions fileowner filegroup chmod error handling

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