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Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 12:16:05 +0300
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Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] fgets()/fgetss() BC break in HEAD
From: antony@zend.com (Antony Dovgal)

On 11/14/2006 11:24 AM, Richard Quadling wrote:
> As we are often told on this list, PHP is not C.
> 
> It seems utterly ridiculous to return maxlen-1.

It also might seem ridiculous to have strlen() and str_replace(), but there are good reasons to have strlen() instead of str_len().

> Whilst this is sure as hell a BC, it should work "properly". If I ask
> for 10, I want 10. I wouldn't have asked for 10 otherwise. Having to
> know the "magic" to get things to work is plainly bad magic.
> 
> In terms of KISS, 10 means 10.

In terms of KISS BC means "backward compatibility". 
If you don't want BC - release your own PHP.
 
> Unless PHP !== KISS therefore 10 === 9.
> 
> Make the break. Deal with it. It was wrong and now it is fixed.

"It works this way since PHP3" means "it works right" even if there was a bug in PHP3.
That's because thousands of people could rely on this behaviour (which is, I repeat, 
very well documented and pretty much expected).

-- 
Wbr, 
Antony Dovgal