Req #65612 [Com]: Calling the result of a function call as a function causes a parse error

Edit report at https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=65612&edit=1 ID: 65612 Comment by: tri at iki dot fi Reported by: tdammers at gmail dot com Summary: Calling the result of a function call as a function causes a parse error Status: Open Type: Feature/Change Request Package: Scripting Engine problem Operating System: Any (debian wheezy e.a.) PHP Version: Irrelevant Block user comment: N Private report: N New Comment: Looks like a parser issue to me. Expression result can't be called directly but storing the same result to variable first and then calling the variable is ok. Should it parse correctly, there should be no difference, because it's basically a same thing. However foo()() kind of syntax may be somewhat ambiguous and create mystical precedence issues (too tired to figure out now, whether this is really a problem, e.g. "foo()->xxx()()"), so maybe (foo())() would be a better idea. Anyways neither of which works. I think this one should be fixed. Previous Comments: ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2013-09-05 21:15:52] aharvey@php.net Relevant RFC (that never went anywhere, AFAIR): https://wiki.php.net/rfc/fcallfcall ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2013-09-04 08:08:06] tdammers at gmail dot com Description: ------------ Calling the return value from a function as a function directly (without storing the return value in an intermediate variable) results in a parse error. Apparently, the PHP parser does not understand foo()() or (foo())(). Test script: --------------- <?php function foo($a) { return function ($b) use ($a) { print "$a, $b!\n"; }; } foo("Hello")("world"); Expected result: ---------------- Program prints "Hello, world!" Actual result: -------------- PHP Parse error: syntax error, unexpected '(' in /home/tobias/test/test.php on line 9 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Edit this bug report at https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=65612&edit=1