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Date: Tue, 12 Jul 2016 09:36:53 +0100
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Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] Cascade Operator (was Re: [PHP-DEV] Proposal for php7
 class method return)
From: rowan.collins@gmail.com (Rowan Collins)

On 12/07/2016 00:14, Jesse Schalken wrote:
> If so, some consideration should be made as to which syntax is preferred
> to solve this problem generally for both setting properties and calling
> methods.
>
> I prefer the "obj { .. }" syntax because it mirrors object literals in
> JSON/JavaScript, object initializers in C# and C/C++ and Haskell record
> syntax, is particularly concise when nested to create large trees of
> objects, and avoids the noise of "->>" on each line.

All the examples you've given for that syntax are for initialisation, 
and I'm not sure how readable it would be for the general "do several 
things in a row" case:

$counter {
    count(),
    count(),
    count(),
    count()
}

Thinking about it, this becomes something more like a "with" keyword:

with ( $counter ) {
    count();
    count();
    count();
    count();
}

If with(){} could be used as an expression, you'd get something 
remarkably close to your initialiser example:

$this->setBlah(
     with ( Blah::create(4) ) {
             foo = $foo;
             baz = with ( new Baz() ) {
                 markFixed();
                 label = "Hello";
             };
             setBot(9);
     }
);

I'm not sure if this is a good thing or not - with() statements exist in 
a few languages, with varying degrees of acceptance. I don't remember 
seeing one used as an expression like that before, though.

There's a definite awkwardness of what to put on the left side of 
property assignments too...

with ( new Foo ) { var = 1 }
with ( new Foo ) { $var = 1 }
with ( new Foo ) { ->var = 1 }


Overall, it's an interesting idea, but the details are fiddly, and the 
gains marginal, IMO.

Regards,
-- 
Rowan Collins
[IMSoP]