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Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2010 19:29:05 -0500
To: =?iso-8859-1?Q?=22Johannes_Schl=FCter=22?= <johannes@schlueters.de>
Cc: president@basnetworks.net,
 "Stas Malyshev" <smalyshev@sugarcrm.com>,
 internals@lists.php.net
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Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] RFC: C-sharp style property get/set syntax for PHP
From: president@basnetworks.net

>> That is true for PHP variables.  isset is basically saying "does this
>> variable exist", and unset is saying to get rid of it.
>>
>> Because properties (as defined in my RFC) are not a variable, but rath=
er
>> a
>> set of methods, I do not think there would be any way to "unset" them.
>> Like a method, once they are defined, you cannot get rid of them.
>> Therefore "overloading" isset and unset would not make any sense here.
>
> This is different from the PHP Language then. You can isset() and
> unset() "native" properties. And use __isset() and __unset() magic
> methods.
>
> A new feature should be consistent with the language definition.

Its not a matter of consistency - Properties, as a cross-language concept
are not meant to work that way.  You need to think of a property as a set
of two methods that just have a pretty syntax.  Methods cannot be unset,
and nor should properties be allowed to.  isset() should simply tell us
whether a property with the specified name is part of the class or not.

isset() in the way you suggest would just be confusing.  It would allow i=
s
to say that a property does not exist, when in fact it does exist.  This
is not logical.

__isset() is a whole different matter, without it we would have to assume
that every possible member name either exists or does not exist.  This is
because __isset can handle ANY member name.

Properties are bound to a single member name, therefore, they always
exist, unless you were to physically remove that property from the class,
which, like methods, that is not possible.

- Dennis