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Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2023 09:09:15 +0100
Message-ID: <CAPzBOBMx=J=fo1YMChtLwgQvhM4VPMCF5sVaPj=iDV1ENj5CKg@mail.gmail.com>
To: Rowan Tommins <rowan.collins@gmail.com>
Cc: PHP Internals <internals@lists.php.net>
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Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] Re: [RFC][Discussion] Harmonise "untyped" and "typed" properties
From: landers.robert@gmail.com (Robert Landers)

On Thu, Nov 23, 2023 at 8:56=E2=80=AFAM Rowan Tommins <rowan.collins@gmail.=
com> wrote:
>
> On 23 November 2023 01:37:06 GMT, Claude Pache <claude.pache@gmail.com> w=
rote:
> >What you describe in the last sentence is what was initially designed an=
d implemented by the RFC: https://wiki.php.net/rfc/typed_properties_v2 (sec=
tion Overloaded Properties).
> >
> >However, it was later changed to the current semantics (unset() needed i=
n order to trigger __get()) in https://github.com/php/php-src/pull/4974
>
>
> Good find. So not only is it not specified this way in the RFC, it actual=
ly made it into a live release, then someone complained and we rushed out a=
 more complicated version "to avoid WTF". That's really unfortunate.
>
> I'm not at all convinced by the argument in the linked bug report - wheth=
er you get an error or an unexpected call to __get, the solution is to assi=
gn a valid value to the property. And making the behaviour different after =
unset() just hides the user's problem, which is that they didn't expect to =
*ever* have a call to __get for that property.
>
> But I guess I'm 4 years too late to make that case.
>
> Regards,
>
> --
> Rowan Tommins
> [IMSoP]
>
> --
> PHP Internals - PHP Runtime Development Mailing List
> To unsubscribe, visit: https://www.php.net/unsub.php
>

Heh

> But I guess I'm 4 years too late to make that case.

4 years ago, I was using this behavior to write proxies that actually
called things over the network instead of the properties. I didn't
file that bug, but I probably would have filed something similar.
Nowadays, those proxies are dead as we long since generated code based
on interfaces (so they'll pass PHP type checks). I venture once we
have property hooks (assuming that is still a thing coming along),
this behavior can be removed completely as you can just use property
hooks instead of unset to call __get. I'm actually quite excited about
property hooks and hope they pass.

Personally, I haven't used this behavior since 7.4-ish, and I'd be
surprised to see it relied on in modern PHP: code generation is too
easy these days.

Robert Landers
Software Engineer
Utrecht NL