Re: Make debug_zval_dump prints int as long

Rowan Collins wrote: > On 24/07/2015 09:21, Xinchen Hui wrote: >> >> I made a small PR about changes output of some types name in >> debug_zval_dump, to make it behavior consistently with var_dump. >> https://github.com/php/php-src/pull/1434 > > That function desperately needs an updated manual page. The current one > recommends using call-time pass-by-reference (impossible since 5.4), and > the changes to zvals in PHP 7 make its behaviour completely different > from anything in PHP 5. I agree that the manual page needs an update, but it seems that would result in an even more lengthy explanation of the caveats due to the different behavior under PHP 5 and PHP 7, respectively. > I've thought before that it might be best to simply deprecate it, > because the only information it gives is a highly questionable refcount > - though playing around, it seems to be less influenced by the act of > calling the function in PHP 7. It seems to me that the basic issue of debug_zval_dump() is that it is a function and not a language construct, so the refcounts are never "quite right". The variadic nature of the function may add to the confusion, see <http://3v4l.org/UuRse>. > For instance, an IS_REFERENCE zval could be shown as such, with a > separate refcount from the referenced value, so that you could follow > along with the examples in this blog post: > > http://nikic.github.io/2015/05/05/Internal-value-representation-in-PHP-7-part-1 > The current implementation just adds 1 to the target refcount, per this > experiment: http://3v4l.org/NejOM Apparently, this has been done deliberately for compatibility reasons[1]. [1] <https://github.com/php/php-src/blob/php-7.0.0beta2/ext/standard/var.c#L357-L363> -- Christoph M. Becker