curl_get_contents.php

<?php
/**
 * @param  string  $url        The URL to fetch
 * @param  boolean $json       if true, returns decoded json array
 * @param  boolean $show_error if true, prints curl error to screen
 * @author CodeBrauer <https://github.com/CodeBrauer>
 * @return string              result of fetched url, false on failure
 */
function curl_get_contents($url, $json = false, $show_error = false) {
    if (!function_exists('curl_init')) { return file_get_contents($url); } // fallback
    $ch = curl_init();
    $options = array(
        CURLOPT_SSL_VERIFYPEER => false,
        CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER => true,
        CURLOPT_URL            => $url,
        CURLOPT_HEADER         => false,
    );
    curl_setopt_array($ch, $options);
    $response = curl_exec($ch);
    if ($response === false && $show_error) {
        echo 'ERROR: ' . curl_error($ch)."\n";
    }
    curl_close($ch);
    if ($json) {
        return json_decode($response, true);
    }
    return $response;
}