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Date: Sat, 14 Mar 2020 11:57:05 -0400
Cc: =?utf-8?Q?Midori_Ko=C3=A7ak?= <mtkocak@gmail.com>,
 PHP Internals <internals@lists.php.net>
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To: "G. P. B." <george.banyard@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] Associated Arrays as function parameters
From: mike@newclarity.net (Mike Schinkel)

> On Mar 14, 2020, at 11:07 AM, G. P. B. <george.banyard@gmail.com> =
wrote:
>=20
> On Sat, 14 Mar 2020 at 15:43, Midori Ko=C3=A7ak <mtkocak@gmail.com> =
wrote:
>=20
>> Dear Internals,
>>=20
>> I would like to as you a question. I know that it is possible to use =
an
>> array to function parameters like: function(...array); But this =
method is
>> not working when the array is associative.
>>=20
>> Would not be fine if an array like ['param1'=3D>'value', 'param2' =3D> =
'value']
>> would be used in a function like function(param1, param2) regardless =
of the
>> order?
>>=20
>> I think it would make our lives is easier. I'd be also happy if you =
know if
>> there is more effective method to achieve the same result.
>>=20
>> Thanks,
>> Midori
>>=20
>=20
> What you are looking for are Named Parameters, there have been =
multiple
> RFCs about which have all been more or less abandoned from what I see.
> https://wiki.php.net/rfc/namedparameters (=46rom 2012)
> https://wiki.php.net/rfc/named_params (=46rom 2013)
> https://wiki.php.net/rfc/simplified_named_params (=46rom 2016)

Can anyone summarize why these did not move forward? =20

Nikita's proposal sounds pretty good IMO, and I think the follow up =
proposal would have been nice, too. Any port in a storm!

> On a side note, I don't think this feature is *that* useful and if you =
get
> to the point where you want to know which value you are passing to
> which argument it seems, to me, that the function is having too many
> arguments. Also IDEs exist and can tell you the name of the argument.

I would assert a counter to your assertion that this feature would not =
be *that* useful, at least several known use-cases.

The known use-cases include: =20

1. Querying, be it SQL or some other query language.
2. Wrapping API calls (which is a form of querying.)
3. Instantiating properties of an object via __construct().

I assume most on this list are not fans of WordPress but that =
notwithstanding WP_Query() is a good example of a class that accepts an =
array of arguments on instantiation:

- https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/classes/wp_query/

Unfortunately PHP can't type check those WP_Query() arguments, but it =
could type check named parameters of a query() method.

Yes, you can model all arguments as properties of an object, but then =
how would you instantiate that class?  Named properties would make doing =
so much less tedious and allow it to be done in a single expression =
rather than requiring multiple assignment statements.

-Mike
P.S. This would be on my top 5 list of features I would like to see =
added in PHP 8.  FWIW.=