RE: [PHP] The need for strong typing...

you could easily write yourself a typing function to take care of all that (as someone suggested previously) using the same familiar syntax as you want to use in the function definition. function pay($fromaccount, $toaccount, $amount, $memo) { $good = checkInput($fromaccount, "int", $toaccount, "int", $memo, "varchar(1000)" ) or die("Invalid input!"); // code... } > -----Original Message----- > From: Dr. Evil [mailto:drevil@sidereal.kz] > Sent: Thursday, July 12, 2001 10:31 PM > To: rasmus@php.net > Cc: php-general@lists.php.net > Subject: Re: [PHP] The need for strong typing... > > > > The one problem with all your musings is that there is no such thing as an > > integer when it comes to transferring data over http. Everything comes as > > a string. What is done with these strings when they get to the > > application is what matters. It's not like there is an HTML form element > > like <input type=integer> or <input type=float>. All you have is <input > > type=text> when it comes to users entering data and passing it to you. I > > fail to see how strong typing helps you here at all. You are going to > > have to apply some sort of user-space rule once you receive the data. And > > that is quite easy to do with PHP. > > Right, obviously. The only data type in http is the string. However, > there is obviously some value in being able to say: > > function pay(fromaccount int, toaccount int, amount int, memo > varchar(100)) { // .... > > instead of: > > function pay(fromaccount, toaccount, amount, memo) { // .... > > In the former case, even if there was a mistake in checking user > input, at least the script will die instead of trying to do some > operation on some impossible data type. That's a good thing. > > Obviously, all user input must be taken from string type to other > types, but internal functions should be constrained. It's just > another level of checking. It's exactly the same reason why databases > allow you to put constraints into table definitions. Sure, you should > check that the value is positive when you do the INSERT, but you > should also put a constraint into the table. Lots of things go > wrong. > > Also obviously, this capability isn't needed for most of what PHP is > used for, and so maybe it doesn't belong in PHP, and maybe those of us > who are writing more sensitive aps should look into other things. Any > sugestions? > > I don't want people to think that I'm bashing PHP. I'm not. I love > it. I could never go back to perl or anything else. It's just that > I'm working on this one particular financial application, and I'm > paranoid that something will slip through somewhere, and I would feel > more comfortable if I could define variables that have built-in > constraints. Can I use classes to do this? > > -- > PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) > To unsubscribe, e-mail: php-general-unsubscribe@lists.php.net > For additional commands, e-mail: php-general-help@lists.php.net > To contact the list administrators, e-mail: php-list-admin@lists.php.net >