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Date: Wed, 20 Sep 2017 17:23:07 +0200
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Subject: Confusing type mismatch error messages
From: cmbecker69@gmx.de ("Christoph M. Becker")

Hi everybody!

If a type declaration inadvertently uses `boolean` or `integer` (instead
of `bool` and `int`, respectively), the error message is rather confusing:

  […] must be an instance of boolean, boolean given, […]

This issue has been filed as <https://bugs.php.net/65656>, and Adam
submitted <https://github.com/php/php-src/pull/442> to fix that, but
David hinted at the potential BC break, and Joe closed the PR later
stating that such change would require an RFC.

In my opinion, it would be sufficient to change the error message so
that the canonical name of the type would be used, i.e. `bool` and
`int`, respectively, so the message above would read:

  […] must be an instance of boolean, bool given, […]

This change would still be a BC break, but at a far smaller scale than
Adam's PR would have been.

So I am asking for opinions whether this change would be worth the BC
break, and whether a respective RFC could target PHP 7.3, or would have
to wait for PHP 8.

-- 
Christoph M. Becker