Re: Coding styles ...

On 19 September 2015 10:48:17 BST, Lester Caine <lester@lsces.co.uk> wrote: >I get that a lot of people think that the only way forward with PHP is >fully typed, strict checking and blocking anything that may be deemed >to >be risky. However PHP7 has not yet dropped the simple object-less style >of programming that it originally developed from. That is why tidying >up >a simple procedural style of working still has a place. The debate on >'exists()' or to give it a tidier title 'variable_exists()' is more >about just how much of a procedural style of programming remains in PHP >in the future. I agree with the sentiment, but I'm not sure "procedural" is the right keyword here. I know of no other language, however procedural, that allows easy examination of the local symbol table to see if a variable exists. Nor do most procedural languages allow "variable variables" and functionality like extract() and compact(). However, I take the point that, whatever name we give it, this is a style of coding PHP goes some way to supporting, and there's no fundamental reason not to expand that support. The main risk with a multi-paradigm language is it becoming "Jack of all trades, master of none", either because the features themselves are sub-standard, or because people use features designed for one style of coding as stand-ins for other styles. e.g. mixing variable variables and object composition is likely to lead to some confusion. Regards, -- Rowan Collins [IMSoP]