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Date: Mon, 9 Aug 2021 22:50:44 +0200
Message-ID: <CAJpLVh06QszD63U9OWCQg6BtAP77meZ1cpxwE_4b2Gqa_0P2UQ@mail.gmail.com>
To: the mschop <mschopdev@gmail.com>
Cc: PHP internals <internals@lists.php.net>
Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="000000000000b6817705c9268ac5"
Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] RFC Implicit Async (iasync)
From: olleharstedt@gmail.com (=?UTF-8?Q?Olle_H=C3=A4rstedt?=)

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On Mon, 9 Aug 2021, 21:41 the mschop, <mschopdev@gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> This is my first time writing to the internals mailing list, so please
> be patient with me. I would like to get feedback from you on the
> following idea. The idea might seem crazy at the first glance, but the
> longer I thought of it, the cooler I found the idea ;-). I would like
> to share the idea with you and receive feedback. I would currently not
> know how to implement it in the PHP lang. The only way I would be able
> to do this right now with my skill set would be to write a transpiler
> (which is not ideal), which compiles it to e.g. ReactPHP code.
>
> One of the main arguments against PHP is that PHP has a completely
> empty state at the beginning of every request. This implies that on
> every request all of the assets (e.g. configs) needs to be loaded.
> Some applications load it from the database, which makes it even
> worse. This causes slower response times than you can achieve with
> other programming languages.
>
> One way to improve this is by using libraries like ReactPHP for adding
> asynchronicity to PHP. This would enable one to load assets
> concurrently, but migrating existing code bases to asynchronous code
> would be a nightmare, so no one does it. Additionally, asynchronous
> code is harder to read and write.
>
> My suggestion is to add the iasync keyword to PHP. By using the iasync
> keyword, functions or code blocks could be marked as "eventually
> async".
>
> 'eventually async', because it should be possible to disable the
> functionality with an ini setting (especially for debugging purposes).
>
> The keyword could be used on a method level:
>
> public static iasync function doSomething() { ... }
>
> Alternatively it could be used for wrapping a code block:
>
> iasync {
>     // contained code
> }
>
> All blocking IO operations in iasync context would then not return the
> actual value, but instead a promise.
> Those promises are automatically awaited in the following cases:
>
> - The variables value is accessed
> - The iasync context is left
> - A non-iasync code block is invoked
>
> Example (variable access):
>
> iasync {
>   $fileContent = file_get_contents('path'); // returns a promise
>   $arr = [$fileContent]; // not awaited, because the actual value is
> not relevant right now
>   echo($fileContent); // now the code would block, because the value is
> needed
> }
>
> Example (context left):
>
> iasync {
>   $fileContent = file_get_contents('path'); // returns a promise
> } // leaving context would block, until value available
> echo $fileContent;
>
> #######
> Promises
> #######
>
> The promises are not like promises of other languages. They are
> implicit and programmers cannot do anything with it.
>
> ################################
> What is the advantage of this approach?
> ################################
>
> Many applications could profit by iasync because it's so simple to
> use. Application performance could be greatly improved.
>
> Thank you!
>
> Best regards
> mschop
>
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Hi,

Looks kinda similar to what Amphp does with yield and generators? Did you
check that?

Olle

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