Start/Stop Java app from web ui

I've written a IRC Bot in Java, and I've been looking into a way to start and stop the entire program from PHP.

I've thought about using exec() for starting it, and having a socket listener to make it quit, but I've never used a socket listener before, let alone send data to it from PHP!

(Running on windows server, no screen pls)

Any ideas? (Examples? Links?)

Thanks guys.