Is it possible to 'snag' a web page image in PHP?

Question

What I mean is to get the rendered HTML and make a Jpeg/GIF out of it. The idea is to make a digital snapshot of a page.

Answer 1

It will probably require far more effort than it is worth. Why not look at services that already provide this for you? (Like Alexa)

Answer 2

You cannot do that in PHP only ; but, from PHP, you can start a browser, indicating it that it has to load the URL you want, and, then, get a "screenshot" from that browser.

I've heard a couple of time of Firefox being able to do that -- should be a couple of questions+answers here on SO that should help you get started ; here are a couple of those :

• Command line program to create website screenshots (on Linux)
• PHP: How to capture browser window screen with php?
• Is there a way to automatically take a screenshot of a website through a URL?

Answer 3

How about HTML to a PDF? Many libraries available. And PDF's can in turn converted to Image?

That can be done right? Or am I way off?