# [RFC] [VOTE] Shorter Attribute Syntax

- Thread: https://externals.io/message/110640
- Original archive: https://news-web.php.net/php.internals/110640
- Started by Theodore Brown on 2020-06-17T23:59:01+00:00
- Messages: 12
- RFC: Shorter Attribute Syntax (Implemented (PHP 8.0)) — https://externals.io/rfc/shorter_attribute_syntax.md
- Reply by email to internals@lists.php.net
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## #110640 — Theodore Brown — 2020-06-17T23:59:01+00:00

URL: https://externals.io/message/110640#110640

Hi internals,

I've opened voting on the Shorter Attribute Syntax RFC:
https://wiki.php.net/rfc/shorter_attribute_syntax

Since all RFCs require a primary vote with a 2/3 majority, there is
a main vote to approve the secondary ranked-choice vote.

For the ranked-choice poll, fill in your first through third syntax
choices, making sure not to select the same syntax more than
once. You don't have to vote for all three options, but please
don't leave gaps.

Voting will end in two weeks, on 2020-07-01.

Best regards,
Theodore

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## #110641 — Ben Ramsey — 2020-06-18T00:23:25+00:00

URL: https://externals.io/message/110640#110641 · In reply to: #110640

> 
> 
> Hi internals,
> 
> I've opened voting on the Shorter Attribute Syntax RFC:
> https://wiki.php.net/rfc/shorter_attribute_syntax
> 
> Since all RFCs require a primary vote with a 2/3 majority, there is
> a main vote to approve the secondary ranked-choice vote.
> 
> For the ranked-choice poll, fill in your first through third syntax
> choices, making sure not to select the same syntax more than
> once. You don't have to vote for all three options, but please
> don't leave gaps.
> 
> Voting will end in two weeks, on 2020-07-01.


I don’t understand this question:

> Are you okay with re-voting on the attribute syntax for PHP 8.0?

Is this a vote to see if we want to re-vote on the attribute syntax? I
think this is worded awkwardly, and I’m not sure what the outcome of a
yes or not vote means for this question.

If I vote “no,” should I still vote in the secondary vote, or is voting
“no” effectively the same as choosing `<<>>` for all three choices in
the secondary vote?

Or, if I vote “no,” does that mean anything I select for the secondary
vote is thrown out?

Cheers,
Ben

---

## #110644 — Benjamin Eberlei — 2020-06-18T05:46:31+00:00

URL: https://externals.io/message/110640#110644 · In reply to: #110640

On Thu, Jun 18, 2020 at 1:59 AM Theodore Brown <theodorejb@outlook.com>
wrote:

> Hi internals,
>
> I've opened voting on the Shorter Attribute Syntax RFC:
> https://wiki.php.net/rfc/shorter_attribute_syntax
>
> Since all RFCs require a primary vote with a 2/3 majority, there is
> a main vote to approve the secondary ranked-choice vote.
>
> For the ranked-choice poll, fill in your first through third syntax
> choices, making sure not to select the same syntax more than
> once. You don't have to vote for all three options, but please
> don't leave gaps.
>
> Voting will end in two weeks, on 2020-07-01.
>

Thank you for working on this RFC. The syntax question for Attributes is a
really hot topic and I think it is a good idea to have a re-vote with more
varied options than before.

The two new options now proposed didn't even cross my and Martin's mind for
the original RFC, because we strictly looked at syntaxes with no BC breaks.
Both @@ and #[] introduce very small, but also easily detectable and
fixable (via grep + sed or tools of choice).

>
> Best regards,
> Theodore
> --
> 
> To unsubscribe, visit: https://www.php.net/unsub.php

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## #110654 — Aleksander Machniak — 2020-06-18T12:40:32+00:00

URL: https://externals.io/message/110640#110654 · In reply to: #110640

> Hi internals,
> 
> I've opened voting on the Shorter Attribute Syntax RFC:
> https://wiki.php.net/rfc/shorter_attribute_syntax

If @@ wins, will a sequence of 3-or-more @ characters forbidden? It is
not stated in the RFC. I.e. what happens if you write:

@@@ExampleAttribute()
class Foo
{
}

@@@some_function();

-- 
Aleksander Machniak
Kolab Groupware Developer        [https://kolab.org]
Roundcube Webmail Developer  [https://roundcube.net]
----------------------------------------------------
PGP: 19359DC1 # Blog: https://kolabian.wordpress.com

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## #110658 — Mark Randall — 2020-06-18T13:40:26+00:00

URL: https://externals.io/message/110640#110658 · In reply to: #110640

> I've opened voting on the Shorter Attribute Syntax RFC:
> https://wiki.php.net/rfc/shorter_attribute_syntax

I'd be wary of @@ simply because if we do add validation to them, we 
would likely want to use the suppression operator to indicate that a 
class might be omitted (such as if an optional package is not installed).

At which point we're left with @@@ and that's getting into silly-land.

Mark Randall
marandall@php.net

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## #110659 — Derick Rethans — 2020-06-18T14:05:19+00:00

URL: https://externals.io/message/110640#110659 · In reply to: #110641

> > […]
> 
> I don’t understand this question:
> 
> > […]
> 
> Is this a vote to see if we want to re-vote on the attribute syntax? I 
> think this is worded awkwardly, and I’m not sure what the outcome of a 
> yes or not vote means for this question.
> 
> If I vote “no,” should I still vote in the secondary vote, or is 
> voting “no” effectively the same as choosing `<<>>` for all three 
> choices in the secondary vote?

> Or, if I vote “no,” does that mean anything I select for the secondary 
> vote is thrown out?

You should vote in all four polls. If you choose "no" in the first one, 
you might still have a preference for the syntax in case the outcome is 
a "yes".

For your syntax preference, you can't pick the same option more than 
once. This is ranked voting.

cheers,
Derick

-- 
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## #110660 — Theodore Brown — 2020-06-18T14:53:23+00:00

URL: https://externals.io/message/110640#110660

> 
> > […]
> 
> I'd be wary of @@ simply because if we do add validation to them,
> we would likely want to use the suppression operator to indicate
> that a class might be omitted (such as if an optional package is
> not installed).
> 
> At which point we're left with @@@ and that's getting into silly-land.

Hi Mark,

Attributes were already designed to be optional, though, so there's
no need to suppress anything. Attribute validation occurs when you
call `ReflectionAttribute::newInstance()`.

Or are you suggesting that we reverse the way this works, and always
validate attributes unless a suppression operator is used? I'm not
convinced this is a good idea - it would require adding a suppression
operator for all the use cases where attribute information is
collected without an attribute class, which changes something that
should be an internal implementation detail to require different
syntax for end-users of a library. Also, it could be confusing if the
suppression operator only prevents autoloading, but doesn't suppress
other warnings. And if it does suppress other warnings, that would
probably not be what developers want in most cases.

Lastly, in my personal opinion combining the suppression operator
with attribute declarations looks like even worse symbol soup with
with the other syntax options. :)

Best regards,
Theodore

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## #110661 — Theodore Brown — 2020-06-18T14:59:18+00:00

URL: https://externals.io/message/110640#110661 · In reply to: #110654

> If @@ wins, will a sequence of 3-or-more @ characters forbidden?
> It is not stated in the RFC. I.e. what happens if you write:
>
>     @@@ExampleAttribute()
>     class Foo
>     {
>     }
>
>     @@@some_function();

Hi Aleksander,

Yes, those examples would be syntax errors if the `@@` proposal is
accepted.

Regards,
Theodore

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## #110662 — Sara Golemon — 2020-06-18T15:13:45+00:00

URL: https://externals.io/message/110640#110662 · In reply to: #110641

> I don’t understand this question:
>
> > […]
>
> I recommended this as a front-line question so as to remove any hint of
impropriety about the vote.  For example, where the first round of the
secondary vote sits right now (15/15/4) we only have 44% in favor of any
specific change.  That doesn't nearly meet the 2/3rd requirement.  By
having a "pre-vote" to agree on reselecting the syntax, we have a CLEAR
2/3rd majority saying, "Yes, let's revisit this specific question again".

With that clarified, making the decision on what specific syntax we want is
less contentious.  I had *hoped* that we wouldn't have a party split on the
primary vote, that people who wanted <<>> would still favor a
reconfirmation of the syntax since it was specifically cited that this
would be a point to come back to, but atm that's how things turned out.

Is this a vote to see if we want to re-vote on the attribute syntax? I
> think this is worded awkwardly, and I’m not sure what the outcome of a
> yes or not vote means for this question.
>
> Yeah, the wording is awkward, but so is the situation. /shrug
I hope the above clarifies it.


> If I vote “no,” should I still vote in the secondary vote, or is voting
> “no” effectively the same as choosing `<<>>` for all three choices in
> the secondary vote?
>
> On the primary, you should vote yes if you believe it's worth revisiting
the topic, or no if you feel the people have spoken and alligator syntax
means alligator syntax.
Regardless of primary vote: You should vote on the secondary according to
your preference of syntaxes.

-Sara

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## #110810 — Theodore Brown — 2020-07-02T00:13:02+00:00

URL: https://externals.io/message/110640#110810 · In reply to: #110640

> I've opened voting on the Shorter Attribute Syntax RFC:
> https://wiki.php.net/rfc/shorter_attribute_syntax
> 
> Since all RFCs require a primary vote with a 2/3 majority, there is
> a main vote to approve the secondary ranked-choice vote.
> 
> For the ranked-choice poll, fill in your first through third syntax
> choices, making sure not to select the same syntax more than
> once. You don't have to vote for all three options, but please
> don't leave gaps.
> 
> Voting will end in two weeks, on 2020-07-01.

Hi internals,

The Shorter Attribute Syntax RFC vote is now closed. The primary poll
for re-voting on attribute syntax was approved with 50 in favor and 8
opposed.

For the secondary ranked-choice poll there are 61 valid ballots. Since
only one syntax can be elected, the quota is floor(61 / 2) + 1 = 31.

Note: one ballot wasn't counted since it selected the same syntax
more than once. However, this does not change the vote outcome.

In the first round the tally is as follows:

@@: 34 votes
#[]: 21 votes
<<>>: 6 votes

So @@ reaches the quota and has been elected as the final attribute
syntax for PHP 8.

Thank you to everyone who voted!

Theodore

---

## #110819 — Nikita Popov — 2020-07-02T14:14:40+00:00

URL: https://externals.io/message/110640#110819 · In reply to: #110810

On Thu, Jul 2, 2020 at 2:13 AM Theodore Brown <theodorejb@outlook.com>
wrote:

> 
>
> > […]
>
> Hi internals,
>
> The Shorter Attribute Syntax RFC vote is now closed. The primary poll
> for re-voting on attribute syntax was approved with 50 in favor and 8
> opposed.
>
> For the secondary ranked-choice poll there are 61 valid ballots. Since
> only one syntax can be elected, the quota is floor(61 / 2) + 1 = 31.
>
> Note: one ballot wasn't counted since it selected the same syntax
> more than once. However, this does not change the vote outcome.
>
> In the first round the tally is as follows:
>
> @@: 34 votes
> #[]: 21 votes
> <<>>: 6 votes
>
> So @@ reaches the quota and has been elected as the final attribute
> syntax for PHP 8.
>
> Thank you to everyone who voted!
>

Hi Theodore,

Unfortunately, the RFC failed to mention a small, but important detail: The
@@ syntax is ambiguous, as pointed out by Martin Schröder:

function (@@X \ Y $param) { }

Taking into account that PHP allows whitespace between namespace
separators, this can either be interpreted as an attribute "X\Y" on an
untyped parameter, or as an attribute "X" on a "\Y" typed parameter.

The RFC implementation solves this by treating @@ and the following name as
a single token that does not permit whitespace. As such, it will be
interpreted as "X" with an "\Y" typed parameter.

Now, if this had been explicitly mentioned in the RFC, we could have made
an explicit decision to accept this language inconsistency: To forbid
whitespace in namespaced names for attributes only, unlike all other places
in PHP accepting namespaced names. However, it was not mentioned in the
RFC, and apart from the authors of the proposal, I don't think anyone was
aware of this ambiguity.

Fortunately, there is still a way to resolve this issue in a consistent
manner: Change the handling of namespaced names in PHP in general. This is
exactly what is proposed in
https://wiki.php.net/rfc/namespaced_names_as_token. If that proposal is
accepted, then the ambiguity would disappear (and the above example would
become a parse error).

My plan would be to change the
https://wiki.php.net/rfc/namespaced_names_as_token proposal to either only
deal with the handling of namespaced names (i.e. as a single,
whitespace-free token), or at least separate the other reserved keyword
related changes into a separate vote.

If that proposal passes, then there should be no issue with adopting the @@
syntax for attributes (unless there are other problems I'm not aware of?)
If it does not pass, then we'll have to discuss what we want to do here.

Regards,
Nikita

---

## #110820 — Theodore Brown — 2020-07-02T15:01:24+00:00

URL: https://externals.io/message/110640#110820 · In reply to: #110819

> 
> > […]
>
>
> Hi Theodore,
> 
> Unfortunately, the RFC failed to mention a small, but important detail:
> The @@ syntax is ambiguous, as pointed out by Martin Schröder:
>
> function (@@X \ Y $param) { }
> 
> Taking into account that PHP allows whitespace between namespace
> separators, this can either be interpreted as an attribute "X\Y" on an
> untyped parameter, or as an attribute "X" on a "\Y" typed parameter.
> 
> The RFC implementation solves this by treating @@ and the following name
> as a single token that does not permit whitespace. As such, it will be
> interpreted as "X" with an "\Y" typed parameter.
> 
> Now, if this had been explicitly mentioned in the RFC, we could have made
> an explicit decision to accept this language inconsistency: To forbid
> whitespace in namespaced names for attributes only, unlike all other
> places in PHP accepting namespaced names. However, it was not mentioned
> in the RFC, and apart from the authors of the proposal, I don't think
> anyone was aware of this ambiguity.
>
> Fortunately, there is still a way to resolve this issue in a consistent
> manner: Change the handling of namespaced names in PHP in general. This
> is exactly what is proposed in https://wiki.php.net/rfc/namespaced_names_as_token.
> If that proposal is accepted, then the ambiguity would disappear (and
> the above example would become a parse error).
> 
> My plan would be to change the https://wiki.php.net/rfc/namespaced_names_as_token
> proposal to either only deal with the handling of namespaced names
> (i.e. as a single, whitespace-free token), or at least separate the
> other reserved keyword related changes into a separate vote.
> 
> If that proposal passes, then there should be no issue with adopting the
> @@ syntax for attributes (unless there are other problems I'm not aware
> of?) If it does not pass, then we'll have to discuss what we want to do
> here.

Hi Nikita,

Thanks for bringing this up. The original Attributes v2 RFC mentioned
that the shorter @: syntax "does not permit whitespace in attribute
names to allow detecting the ending of the declaration", but when I
wrote the new RFC I didn't think to mention that this applies to @@
as well (the implementation is almost exactly the same).

It certainly could be considered inconsistent that whitespace is
allowed in most namespaced names, but not attributes. On the other
hand, since attributes are new syntax anyway it's arguably okay for
them to have stricter semantics.

But I agree that the ideal solution would be to change the handling of
namespaced names in general, per your https://wiki.php.net/rfc/namespaced_names_as_token
RFC. This would also have the benefit of minimizing the impact of
reserving new keywords.

Best regards,
Theodore