:: breakage - post php 5.2.4

all, i have observed breakage in some of the class functionality involving the scope resolution operator in php after php 5.2.4. in said version strings holding class names can be used w/ the scope resolution operator to resolve static members and class constants. this no longer works in php 5.2.5; ive just installed 5.2.6_rc3 and found that it is not fixed there either. im told this will be restored in 5.3; but if it was working in 5.2.4, why remove it in versions between 5.2.5 (inclusive) and 5.3 (exclusive)? this results in some rather ugly workarounds. im curious if anyone else has noticed this or knows more about it. -nathan