Newsgroups: php.internals
Path: news.php.net
Xref: news.php.net php.internals:37855
Mailing-List: contact internals-help@lists.php.net; run by ezmlm
Received-SPF: unknown (pb1.pair.com: domain php.net does not designate 85.214.94.56 as permitted sender)
Date: Sun, 25 May 2008 10:37:52 +0200
Reply-To: Marcus Boerger <helly@php.net>
Message-ID: <496536410.20080525103752@marcus-boerger.de>
To: Stanislav Malyshev <stas@zend.com>
CC: Chris Stockton <chrisstocktonaz@gmail.com>, 
	Felipe Pena <felipensp@gmail.com>, <internals@lists.php.net>
In-Reply-To: <48078168.1070801@zend.com>
References: <46ccd1ab0804170742g142ed562t4f03339da549a820@mail.gmail.com>  <48077BD2.2000107@zend.com> <e2e02fe0804170950udd38ab3m21e6d658254f042a@mail.gmail.com> <48078168.1070801@zend.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] [RFC] Strict type hints (parameter and return value)
From: helly@php.net (Marcus Boerger)

Hello Stanislav,

Thursday, April 17, 2008, 6:57:12 PM, you wrote:

> Hi!

>> So:
>> function foo($var) { if(!is_int($var)) { throw new exception('not int'); }}

> What's the use of such code? If $var is '1' and not 1, what's the use of

as this seems to be your only argument throughout the discussion, I
suggest we implement is_numeric() and alike or allow a second parameter
that to 'is_*($vaue, $strict=true)' that allows to switch to non strict
mocde. We then could easily allow 'numeric' as another type hint. Or in
other words I see this as a completely separate discussion. There are
two discussions:
a) do we want native type hints
b) do we want an easy ability to deal with compatible types in type hinting

marcus

> throwing an exception and having to handle it later (basically by 
> failing the task, since you don't know how to do foo() now) - instead of 
> just doing with that 1 what was intended for? There's no any difference 
> between 1 and '1' that can be important to anybody. Only difference is 
> the way it is represented in underlying bits in zvals, about which 
> nobody should ever care. That's like making function that would accept 
> only arguments that has 3'rd bit of pointer set to 1 and 5th bit set to 
> 0, and reject all others. No sane application should ever behave this 
> way. Writing such function is just plain wrong, it replaces the 
> substance of programming with nitpicking over the details that are not 
> important. Whole phenomenon of dynamic languages has grown on the 
> principle of liberating people from caring for bits and concentrate on 
> substance, and now you try to drag the bits back in.

>> which is called like this in both cases, maybe with a try catch etc etc:
>> foo((int) $baz['bar']);

> So every time you call foo you need try/catch? And that's supposed to be 
> _good_?
> -- 
> Stanislav Malyshev, Zend Software Architect
> stas@zend.com   http://www.zend.com/
> (408)253-8829   MSN: stas@zend.com




Best regards,
 Marcus