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To: tyson andre <tysonandre775@hotmail.com>,
 Nikita Popov <nikita.ppv@gmail.com>
Cc: "internals@lists.php.net" <internals@lists.php.net>
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Date: Wed, 20 Jan 2021 16:43:44 +0100
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Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] Proposal: short_var_export($value, bool $return=false,
 int $flags=0)
From: dik.takken@gmail.com (Dik Takken)

On 19-01-2021 16:12, tyson andre wrote:
> It seems inconsistent and prone to bugs when refactoring (e.g. converting to string and not using the result)
> to have two functions named var_export where one prints by default and the other doesn't, but otherwise .
> Changing to a different name entirely would solve that, such as var_repr(), var_representation(), serialize_[value_]as_php_snippet(), etc.
> 

I am considering to try and introduce a __repr() magic method that is
similar to the __repr__() method from Python. Having a var_repr() method
which does not use the __repr() method would be confusing. So I would
like to suggest not to use that name.

As the intent of the resulting string is to obtain PHP code that will
construct the variable, another option might be: var_constructor().

Regards,
Dik Takken