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Date: Sun, 11 Jan 2015 21:50:21 -0800
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To: francois@tekwire.net
Cc: Pierre Joye <pierre.php@gmail.com>, Stanislav Malyshev <smalyshev@gmail.com>, 
	PHP internals <internals@lists.php.net>
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Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] One API to rule them all? (Was: Extension Prepend Files)
From: pollita@php.net (Sara Golemon)

On Sun, Jan 11, 2015 at 7:44 PM, Fran=C3=A7ois Laupretre
<francois@tekwire.net> wrote:
> - Extension exposes only PHP functions and constants (no OO),
> - Each PHP function argument must accept a scalar, an array, or both ('mi=
xed' case).
> - one or more PHP function arguments can be optional
> - PHP function arguments can be passed by value or by reference.
> - PHP functions return value must be a fixed type (cannot return differen=
t types depending on context). Return value type can be null, bool, long, d=
ouble, string, or array.
> - Constant value must be static (cannot be computed during MINIT).
>
Why so limited?  Like, why disallow objects completely? That feels
like a big step backward for PHP.  Any why not computed constants?
(Assuming they stay constant throughout the process lifetime)

> I have pushed a first half-baked version of the extension generator I was=
 thinking about.
> Just for a look, don't try to run it. I started with json and yaml suppor=
t for metadata definition.
> We can easily add another supported syntax if needed but these should be =
enough.
> Look at https://github.com/flaupretre/php-ext-gen/tree/develop
>
I'll be honest, I'm not a big fan of code-generation.  I find it
introduces complexity and it's not needed here.  Lots of languages
manage to put together a stable API without resorting to code
generators.

-Sara