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Date: Tue, 15 Jan 2008 16:12:22 -0600 (CST)
To: "Sam Barrow" <sam@sambarrow.com>
Cc: internals@lists.php.net
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Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] SUMMARY: Array syntax
From: ceo@l-i-e.com ("Richard Lynch")

On Fri, January 11, 2008 4:13 pm, Sam Barrow wrote:
> On Sat, 2008-01-12 at 00:52 +0300, Antony Dovgal wrote:
>> On 11.01.2008 22:13, Sam Barrow wrote:
>> >> input from many people is great, moreover - it is necessary.
>> However, it
>> >> is not the same as deciding by arithmetical majority of votes of
>> whoever
>> >> cares to vote on technical questions.
>> >
>> > Which is a valid point in most cases, but this is not technical,
>> it's
>> > purely syntactic.
>>
>> Surely it's technical, doesn't matter what exactly it's supposed to
>> affect - its syntax or its functionality.
>>
>> > If we were voting on implementing a highly advanced technical
>> feature
>> > then yes, people who know what they're talking about should be
>> given
>> > more weight, but in this case I don't think so.
>>
>> You're not going to fix bug reports related to the parser, or are
>> you?
>
> I don't know exactly what you mean, and what does that have to do with
> anything?
>
> All I said was a simple fact. This is syntactic, not functional.
> Some people like looking at square brackets while some don't. Nobody
> on
> this thread is more qualified than anybody else on this subject, it's
> only a matter of opinion. That's it.

His point is that it IS functional.

Somewhere in the guts of PHP there is a lexical parser that has to
deal with the nifty new syntax, and do the right thing with it, and if
it doesn't work right, somebody somewhere has to deal with the bug
reports about it being broken.

Somebody has to write the patch, somebody has to maintain the
resulting code.

Somebody has to take on the task of documenting the new syntax.

Somebody has to answer all the questions on PHP-General about how the
new syntax works.

And so on.

There is no such thing as a non-functional change, if you are touching
the C code.

-- 
Some people have a "gift" link here.
Know what I want?
I want you to buy a CD from some indie artist.
http://cdbaby.com/from/lynch
Yeah, I get a buck. So?