rename T_PAAMAYIM_NEKUDOTAYIM to T_DOUBLE_COLON

WTF is T_PAAMAYIM_NEKUDOTAYIM?

This has to be THE most asked question by new php developers when they come across it.
Can we please change the token name to T_DOUBLE_COLON so I don't have to hear about it
constantly?

Those that disagree don't do enough PHP support to know how often it is asked. it's worth it.

Is it that hard to at least review the mailing list archives before ranting?

At least posters would sound like they have educated themselves on why what
came to be, and argue sensibly for changes.

obviously the old arguments didn't work, time to start anew.

using a name like "admin" in your email headers isn't going to be very receptive.

For what its worth its Hebrew for double colon. I'm all for the change, will see what I can do next week.

• S

obviously the old arguments didn't work, time to start anew.

obviously you didn't stop to learn the art of persuasion.

I would prefer this was not changed.

+1 (for the same reasons)

I agree with Andi, Rasmus and the other people in favor.

This token name is part of the history of PHP and adds to it's
uniqueness.

But besides this: renaming the constant is probably not going to solve
the problem (at least not anytime soon).

Changing this constant would mean breaking BC (some people using the
tokenizer extension might use it) and thus officially it should only
be implemented in PHP-next.
This means that the support requests will be coming in for a long time
as it not even planned for release or anything.

Suppose that this rename would happen in the next minor release: most
shared hosts lag immensily with their installed PHP version and I
reckon most questions come from inexperienced / starting developers
working with / on said hosts. And this means it will again take a long
time before you notice any effect. (not to mention that Linux distros
also lag).

(additionally I wonder why people ask such a simple question on IRC
whilst googling provides your answer faster..)

Bottom line: I'd opt for keeping it.

Kind regards,

Mike van Riel

2010/11/1 Richard Lynch ceo@l-i-e.com

WTF is T_PAAMAYIM_NEKUDOTAYIM?

This has to be THE most asked question by new php developers when they
come across it. Can we please change the token name to T_DOUBLE_COLON
so I don't have to hear about it constantly?

Those that disagree don't do enough PHP support to know how often it
is
asked. it's worth it.

-1

Instead of renaming the token, I prefer to associate a literal string to
each token, to have a legible error message, without the T_ being shown.

For example, we could use in the Bison grammar file:
%token T_PAAMAYIM_NEKUDOTAYIM "::"

So that the error message become:

$ sapi/cli/php -r '::'
Parse error: syntax error, unexpected :: in Command line code on line 1

Instead of the known "unexpected T_PAAMAYIM_NEKUDOTAYIM" one.

Years and years ago that was the intent. I didn't think there was a
clean way to do that in yacc though.

-Rasmus

2010/11/1 Richard Lynch ceo@l-i-e.com

WTF is T_PAAMAYIM_NEKUDOTAYIM?

This has to be THE most asked question by new php developers when they
come across it. Can we please change the token name to T_DOUBLE_COLON
so I don't have to hear about it constantly?

Those that disagree don't do enough PHP support to know how often it
is
asked. it's worth it.

-1

Instead of renaming the token, I prefer to associate a literal string to
each token, to have a legible error message, without the T_ being shown.

For example, we could use in the Bison grammar file:
%token T_PAAMAYIM_NEKUDOTAYIM "::"

So that the error message become:

$ sapi/cli/php -r '::'
Parse error: syntax error, unexpected :: in Command line code on line 1

Instead of the known "unexpected T_PAAMAYIM_NEKUDOTAYIM" one.

Thanks Felipe, you are my hero.
Anybody else thinks that this thread is very similar to the last array
dereferencing discussion?
internals@lists.php.net/msg46789.html" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://www.mail-archive.com/internals@lists.php.net/msg46789.html

Somebody brought up the idea, most of the veterans tried to dismiss without
discussion, pointing out, that its an old topic, and nothing will change,
status quo, others tried to bend the thread to the lemon patch.
and Felipe solved the original problem that everybody thought impossible, or
much harder, than it was actually.

so I think we should ask Felipe more about the unsolvable problems in PHP,
and maybe we shouldn't stop discussions about old topics, because maybe the
environment around the problems changed with time.

Tyrael

2010/11/1 Richard Lynch ceo@l-i-e.com

WTF is T_PAAMAYIM_NEKUDOTAYIM?

This has to be THE most asked question by new php developers when they
come across it. Can we please change the token name to T_DOUBLE_COLON
so I don't have to hear about it constantly?

Those that disagree don't do enough PHP support to know how often it
is
asked. it's worth it.

-1

Instead of renaming the token, I prefer to associate a literal string to
each token, to have a legible error message, without the T_ being shown.

For example, we could use in the Bison grammar file:
%token T_PAAMAYIM_NEKUDOTAYIM "::"

So that the error message become:

$ sapi/cli/php -r '::'
Parse error: syntax error, unexpected :: in Command line code on line 1

Instead of the known "unexpected T_PAAMAYIM_NEKUDOTAYIM" one.

+1 on implementing this so we don't have to wait for lemon.
While knowing how to use a search engine is good, it's even better to not
have to and save the time spent on it.

--
Regards,
Felipe Pena