__get, __set, __clone

Hi, in the past 2 days i have been looking into php5 and it's new features. I am not a psecialiste of OOP (only been OOPing for 2 month) For a moment i tought that __set would allow me not to have to define a methode __set that would set a value to a member variable. It seems like we have to define the class __set and __get. for example i tought i would be able to do. class a{ function __construct(){ $this->__set("var_name1","value1"); $this->__set("var_name2","value2"); } } I read these 2 tutorial http://www.phpbuilder.com/columns/argerich20030411.php3?page=5 (the explanation seems really bad to me and does not show any usefull way to use these functions) http://talks.php.net/show/php5intro/25 This one well i comes back to the same thing as if i code it my self. So my big question is why , when , how do we use these features (__get,__set) For a moment i tought i would save me time, but if i have to redefine them what is the point ? I guess i am somewhat confuse on this issue, any explanation would be appreciated. Thanks -- Yann Larrivee <yannl@istop.com>