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Date: Sun, 9 Nov 2025 20:55:31 +0100
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Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] RFC: Namespace-Scoped Visibility for Methods and
 Properties
To: Rob Landers <rob@bottled.codes>, =?UTF-8?B?QWxleGFuZHJ1IFDEg3RyxINuZXNj?=
 =?UTF-8?Q?u?= <drealecs@gmail.com>
Cc: PHP internals <internals@lists.php.net>
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From: tim@bastelstu.be (=?UTF-8?Q?Tim_D=C3=BCsterhus?=)

Hi

On 11/9/25 20:41, Rob Landers wrote:
> class P {
>      private(namespace) function x() {}
> }
> 
> class C extends P {
>      protected function x() {}
> }
> 
> This behaves the same as overriding a private method with a protected/public one today: the parent’s method is private to its declaring class, so the second example is allowed.

This is unsound. As we have established, neither `private(namespace)` 
nor `protected` is a subset of each other.

Specifically allowing this breaks the following (everything is declared 
in the same namespace):

     class P {
         private(namespace) function x() { }
     }
     class C extends P {
         protected function x() { }
     }

     function f(P $p) {
         $p->x(); // legal, because f is in the same namespace as P.
     }

     f(new C()); // breaks, because C::x() is protected and thus not 
legal to access from f / the global scope.

Best regards
Tim Düsterhus