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Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 12:27:13 -0500
To: Sean Coates <sean@caedmon.net>
Sender: Ilia Alshanetsky <iliaal@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] Namespaces in PHP 6 - ++$take
From: ilia@prohost.org (Ilia Alshanetsky)


On 10-Nov-06, at 11:51 AM, Sean Coates wrote:

> The way I see it is that implementing namespaces is a technical  
> hurdle,
> and the reasons we haven't jumped it are political, not technical.

That's a bit of a circular logic no? There are indeed technical  
challenges to implementing namespaces, these reasons have been  
covered in previous discussions many times, since no adequate  
solution was devised they were never implemented. Once those issues  
are resolved or at the very least solutions are known, we can  
consider whether or not this is something that's truly needed.

> Complacency: Most of the time, I'm happy to maintain the status quo in
> PHP-land. However, the lack of namespaces is causing more trouble than
> its absence is preventing. I think most PHP users would agree that
> namespaces are a welcome addition, and without them, PHP suffers.  
> Let's
> take this in small steps and implement optional userspace namespacing.
> There's no need to dive head-first into this and make dramatic moves
> like putting all core functions into a PHP namespace. Baby steps,  
> please.

I think this is a bogus argument. In order to benefit from namespaces  
you need to use them, just like to benefit from containment through  
prefixing you need to prefix functions/classes/etc... Namespaces are  
not a magic bullet that will instantly make your problems go away and  
make your code better. If anything it'll make code complex and  
intertwined, introduce serious scope issue most people have not had  
to consider up until now and so on. It will without a doubt increase  
language complexity as well, which generally translates to a loss in  
performance.


Ilia Alshanetsky