How to read .doc using PHP

Here is a function to read the content of a .doc file using PHP.
Note: doesn't work with .docx

<?php
function readWord($filename) {
  if(file_exists($filename))
  {
      if(($fh = fopen($filename, 'r')) !== false ) 
      {
         $headers = fread($fh, 0xA00);

         // 1 = (ord(n)*1) ; Document has from 0 to 255 characters
         $n1 = ( ord($headers[0x21C]) - 1 );

         // 1 = ((ord(n)-8)*256) ; Document has from 256 to 63743 characters
         $n2 = ( ( ord($headers[0x21D]) - 8 ) * 256 );

         // 1 = ((ord(n)*256)*256) ; Document has from 63744 to 16775423 characters
         $n3 = ( ( ord($headers[0x21E]) * 256 ) * 256 );

         // 1 = (((ord(n)*256)*256)*256) ; Document has from 16775424 to 4294965504 characters
         $n4 = ( ( ( ord($headers[0x21F]) * 256 ) * 256 ) * 256 );

         // Total length of text in the document
         $textLength = ($n1 + $n2 + $n3 + $n4);

         $extracted_plaintext = fread($fh, $textLength);

         // if you want to see your paragraphs in a new line, do this
         // return nl2br($extracted_plaintext);
         return $extracted_plaintext;
      } else {
        return false;
      }
  } else {
    return false;
  }  
}
?>

Source: Mukund Topiwala