Req #52583 [Com]: Improved casting and hinting, new magic method __cast()

Edit report at https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=52583&edit=1 ID: 52583 Comment by: thomas dot sahlin at invented dot se Reported by: martin dot leucht at gmail dot com Summary: Improved casting and hinting, new magic method __cast() Status: Open Type: Feature/Change Request Package: Class/Object related Operating System: Irrelevant PHP Version: Irrelevant Block user comment: N Private report: N New Comment: I think solution 2 would be better since that would also allow caching objects: public static function __cast($id) { if (!isset(self::$cache[$id])) self::$cache[$id] = new self($id); return self::$cache[$id]; } Previous Comments: ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2013-05-03 19:16:50] mkutschker-php at yahoo dot com If we have both casting (the other one being #46128) then perhaps the names should be __castFrom() and castTo(). Or perhaps even __castFromInt() and castToInt() and so on. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2012-09-05 02:53:14] aharvey@php.net Not a dupe: request #46128 covers casting the other way. (That alone is probably a good argument for changing the proposed magic method name.) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2012-09-04 14:20:42] qfox at ya dot ru dup?: https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=46128&thanks=6 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2010-10-19 11:41:50] rayro at gmx dot de pretty nice, awesome feature! but i have some recommendations on this: 1) is it true that i cannot cast to a boolean false? what about throwing the error if no return was made? the user is able to throw some exception or will simple not return anything to use the default error mechanism... 2) i think there should be 2 additional types of functions covering your 2 solutions by simply change the name. for your case 1 this should be __cast, whereas 2 could be __hint? the essential difference is that __hint will be called in the functions arguments and __cast will be called elsewhere? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2010-10-03 18:45:29] + at ni-po dot com @degeberg: Doesn't the RFC cover casting the other way round? I.e. Class -> Scalar ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 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=52583 -- Edit this bug report at https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=52583&edit=1