Req #26789 [Com]: NullPointerException desired

Edit report at https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=26789&edit=1 ID: 26789 Comment by: 3leven11 at gmail dot com Reported by: davidc at blesys dot com Summary: NullPointerException desired Status: Wont fix Type: Feature/Change Request Package: *General Issues Operating System: (doesn't apply) PHP Version: 5.0.0b3 (beta3) Block user comment: N Private report: N New Comment: @nikic, I completely understand what you are saying, and I have indeed altered my code to pass the exception up the chain to the callers of the sub class constructors. I still think a NullPointerException over a Fatal Error would be nice, but that is just my Java developer way of thinking. I appreciate you taking the time to respond. Previous Comments: ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2012-10-20 09:52:08] pajoye@php.net In addition to Niki's comment, there is no such thing like pointer in PHP. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2012-10-20 08:37:27] nikic@php.net @3leven11: I have a hard time understanding your particular situation. I mean, if you can't connect to the database, then you should throw an exception *at that point* (PDO actually does it for you, but you choose to silence the exception). If you need this to check for such error conditions then I would highly recommend you to just throw an exception as the error occurs rather than passing NULLs around everywhere. That's basically the "error code" way of handling errors (in your case even without the code) and it indeed involves checking every single call. That's why people mostly prefer throwing exceptions. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2012-10-20 04:12:14] 3leven11 at gmail dot com I find the comment by derick@php.net to be very unhelpful. Testing an object for null every time you use it while being a solution, is a very primitive way of ensuring your application does not crash in an ungraceful manner. Exception handling, is a much more efficient way of ensuring your application can continue running when abnormal events occur. While I agree that it is up to the developer to handle if an object is null, I do see a case where checking for null is an unnecessary performance hit on any application. And could be avioded by the implementation of a NullPointerException in PHP. Handling errors in code is up to the developers, but they can only handle them the best way they know how, with the tools provided to them. Take the example of an object that you rarely expect to be null, like a PDO object. I expect my database to be available 99.9% of the time, are you really implying that it is better practice to test for null every I use this object rather than enclose my use of a PDO object within a try catch block, handling any exception that may arise? example code: // base class namespace lib\translator; use lib\database as db; class EntityTranslator { protected $dbConn; public function __construct() { try { $this->dbConn = db\Database::getInstance(); } catch(\PDOException $e) { // do some error logging here } } } // subclass namespace lib\translator; use lib\entity as entity; class OrderRequestTranslator extends EntityTranslator { public function __construct() { parent::__construct(); } public function createOrderRequest() { $request = new entity\Request(); try { $stmt = $this->dbConn->prepare("CALL createRequest()"); $stmt->execute(); $rowCount = $stmt->rowCount(); if ($rowCount == 1) { $row = $stmt->fetch(\PDO::FETCH_ASSOC); // do stuff with the data here } return $request; } catch (\PDOException $pdoe) { // do error logging here } catch (\Exception $ex) { // do error logging here } } } So in the above example, if there is an exception while connecting to the database, which as I pointed out I expect to very rare, and it may actually never happen, that before issuing the call to $this->dbConn I should check if $this->dbConn is null? This is the perfect case for where my catch(\Exception $ex) {} block would be perfect. I really never expect to be in that code, from my point of view, and correct me if I am wrong, I have not coded my application in an incorrect way, except for the fact that PHP has no NullPointerException. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2012-03-13 22:22:56] me at joshsera dot com The point of an NPE is so you can enclose code in a try/catch block instead of wrapping every statement in an if that tests for null. It makes for more readable code. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2004-01-05 03:00:01] derick@php.net If you want to have "NULL" objects, test if an object is NULL before you call methods on it. There is no chance this will be implemented. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The remainder of the comments for this report are too long. To view the rest of the comments, please view the bug report online at https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=26789 -- Edit this bug report at https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=26789&edit=1