Maximum execution time exceeded

Hi,

I need to run a PHP3 script from the web after submitting a form. This
script generates several 'html' files with data collected from a PostgreSQL
database. It is a while loop wherein, for each record returned in my
previous query, one file is generated. So for each 'while loop' iteration, a
new file is opened for rewriting, all info written to it, and then closed at
the end of the loop, where we proceed to the next record (another file to be
generated).

When running this with PHP2 & mSQL, files were generated progressively, so
that I could see the files being written at a Telnet prompt while the script
was running.

Now, using PostgreSQL & PHP3 I faced the following problem:

The time needed to generate all these files must be a couple of minutes. But
I received at my browser the following message issued by PHP3:

Fatal error: Maximum execution time of 30 seconds exceeded in
/usr/local/etc/httpd/htdocs/myfile.php3 on line 62

I added the following line to my 'httpd.conf' file, as I noted this should
be a PHP3 time limit:

php3_max_execution_time 360

But now my browser is kept in the submission form page (I am not taken to
the second page, where I also output the contents written to the files to
the screen) and after a while I receive a message from the browser stating
that it could not complete the operation. And no updated files are generated
during the time it takes to issue the error message.

Any ideas of what is the problem?

TIA,

Paulo