Bug #68445 [Opn]: Optional arguments may precede required arguments in function declarations

Edit report at https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=68445&edit=1 ID: 68445 Updated by: ajf@php.net Reported by: ajf at ajf dot me Summary: Optional arguments may precede required arguments in function declarations Status: Open Type: Bug Package: Scripting Engine problem Operating System: OS X Yosemite PHP Version: 5.6.3 Block user comment: N Private report: N New Comment: We could perhaps deprecate it, but I doubt there's much advantage to doing so. It would hit a lot of existing code for what is really mostly a cosmetic difference. Besides, PHP doesn't need to warn of this specific issue, code sniffers and IDEs can do that if they want. Previous Comments: ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2016-07-15 20:07:56] nikic@php.net @dmitry: In general I agree, but I don't think we can change this for PHP 7.1. I think many people use this hack to get nullable argument types in PHP < 7.1. They won't be able to use real nullable types unless they require PHP 7.1, which is not realistic. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2016-07-14 11:08:26] dmitry@php.net I think, declaration of arguments without default values after the ones with default values - should be prohibited by compiler (at least since PHP-7.1) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2014-11-18 21:31:42] ajf at ajf dot me That's a fair point. This would change if nullable typehints (as proposed by Levi's RFC: https://wiki.php.net/rfc/nullable_typehints) were added. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2014-11-18 20:08:50] mike@php.net Mind that this is also the only way to declare an argument with a nullable class hint. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2014-11-18 19:47:12] ajf at ajf dot me Description: ------------ Optional arguments can be specified before required arguments, which would suggest that you can omit them. Yet, if you actually call the function, it will complain that you didn't pass the required arguments. The fix would be either to support optional arguments before required arguments at call-time, or to error when this is done in a function declaration. Test script: --------------- <?php function foo($a = NULL, $b) { var_dump($b); } foo(2); Expected result: ---------------- int(2) Actual result: -------------- Warning: Missing argument 2 for foo(), called in %s on line 7 and defined in /in/b1HC3 on line 3 Notice: Undefined variable: b in %s on line 4 NULL ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Edit this bug report at https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=68445&edit=1