Returning PEAR_Error object from constructor

On 24 Apr 2001, Stig Sæther Bakken wrote: > > But when, I run it: > > > > $c = new Crypt_CBC('', 'des'); > > > > $c is not a PEAR_Error object. That's what I'm trying to do. :) > Sorry, the constructor's return value is ignored, the "new" operator > will always give you the instantiated object back. What you need to > do is to take everything that can fail out of the constructor and add > an initialization method. > > > Overwriting the $this variable is not a good idea. :-) > > > > Agreed. :) However, this seems to be the only way to get the Crypt_CBC > > constructor to not create a Crypt_CBC object. > > Huh, does that work? Yes it seems to work. This brings me a question, is that a bug or a feature. Meaning, would it be considered bad coding (in PEAR's point of view) if you returned the error object from constructor? In some cases I find it more elegan't to give all the needed parameters to constructor rather than allways have a separate initialization method. -- Mika Tuupola http://www.appelsiini.net/~tuupola/