Can we increase PHP timeouts with ini_set ()?

[markowe]

I need to run a big batch import once a day and because it is inevitably getting throttled (not enough to bother BH I don't think), it is taking somewhat more than a minute to execute, thus timing out either due to the default_socket_timeout setting or mysql.connect_timeout in php.ini, which are set to 60 by default (I think PHP is timing out first, but doesn't make much difference really). I was thinking of extending both these settings to, say, 120-180, but just temporarily using ini_set - does BH allow this? Would it have any negative implications, other than increasing my throttled seconds per day (which are currently only about 60s anyway)?

I know I can just try this for myself, but I don't want to bring the other sites on my account (or the wrath of Bluehost) crashing down! So would appreciate input from anyone in the know.

Thanks,

Mark

P.S. Oops, I meant max_execution_time (default 30s), not default_socket_timeout, but same principle - by my reckoning my script actually takes 90-120s to execute (import of some 165,000 dbase entries). Would it be acceptable if I temporarily increased this value?

[matizaaa]

yes you can increase it to what ever value you want, make sure that all the directories are using the same php.ini file and if they are not you might need to copy the php.ini to your scripts directory.