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Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2020 08:15:27 +0100
Message-ID: <CAFLRTJ_HztYZkJ=yR6AX-F==pDo6CXg70ocGxFuhjR9BKE2C0A@mail.gmail.com>
To: PHP Internals <internals@lists.php.net>
Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="0000000000008657fc059dbacea6"
Subject: What about a magic __toArray() method?
From: mtkocak@gmail.com (=?UTF-8?Q?Midori_Ko=C3=A7ak?=)

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As you know we have __toString method that runs whenever an object is
typecasted to string or it is directly echoed.

<?php

$class = (new class{
  public function __toString(){
    echo "casted\n";
    return "mahmut\n";
  }
});

echo $class;
$casted = (string)$class;

/*
prints:
casted
mahmut
casted
mahmut
*/


As you know toArray() method implemented when an object is converted into
and array and most of the time when a plain data object is sent to
front-end.

Having a magic method like __toString called __toArray would be useful to
detect and act on conversion events.

Roughly it would be like:

<?php

$class = (new class{
  public function __toArray(){
    echo "casted\n";
    return
    [
      'key'=>'value'
    ];
  }
});


$casted = (array)$class;
print_r($casted);

/*
prints:
Array
(
    [key] => value
)
mahmut
*/

What would you think? I think it would add value.

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