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Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] [Concept] Flip relative function lookup order
 (global, then local)
To: internals@lists.php.net
Date: Fri, 23 Aug 2024 03:27:39 -0400
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From: lists@ageofdream.com (Nick Lockheart)

On Fri, 2024-08-23 at 07:39 +0100, Rowan Tommins [IMSoP] wrote:
>=20
>=20
> On 23 August 2024 00:15:19 BST, Mike Schinkel <mike@newclarity.net>
> wrote:
> > Having to prefix with a name like Foo, e.g. Foo\strlen() is FAR
> > PREFERABLE to _\strlen() because at least it provides satiating
> > information rather than the empty calories of a cryptic shorthand.=C2=
=A0
> > #jmtcw, anyway.
>=20
> I knew I'd regret keeping the example short. Realistically, it's not
> a substitute for "\Foo\strlen", it's a substitute for
> "\AcmeComponents\SplineReticulator\Utilities\Text\strlen".
>=20
> Having a syntax for "relative to current" is incredibly common in
> other path-like syntaxes. The most common marker is ".", and ".\foo"
> is literally how you'd refer to something in the current directory
> under DOS/Windows. But unfortunately, we don't have "." available, so
> I wondered if "_" would feel similar enough.
>=20
> Another option would be to find a shorter keyword than "namespace" to
> put it in front. "ns\strlen(...)" is an obvious step from what we
> have currently, but it's not very obvious what it means, so maybe
> there's a different word we could use.
>=20
> Rowan Tommins
> [IMSoP]

Could be mistaken, but I think the way PHP handles namespaces
internally is sort of the same as a long string, rather than as a
tree/hierarchy.

ie. \AcmeComponents\SplineReticulator\Utilities\Text\strlen

is really like:

class AcmeComponentsSplineReticulatorUtilitiesTextstrlen {

   public function __construct(){

   }

}

And the "AcmeComponentsSplineReticulatorUtilitiesText" just kind of
gets appended to the front when the class name is registered.

I haven't done work on the namespace code, but I recall reading this
somewhere recently.