Array key access on non-array values - to be made illegal?

10 years ago by Marco Pivetta — view source — reply

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Hello,

I just stumbled upon behavior that seems to "fail silently" regardless of
its very questionable validity:

<?php

$a = 1;

var_dump($a[123]); // NULL, no notice

https://3v4l.org/b3rDr

Are there specific reasons why no notice is thrown? Is it by design? If so,
does anyone remember why?

I haven't checked if this affects other types too. I know that an
assignment to an array key of a non-array would cause a cast of the value
to array, but a mere read operation should surely cause a notice to be
raised in the above scenario.

Cheers,

Marco Pivetta

http://twitter.com/Ocramius

http://ocramius.github.com/

10 years ago by Ivan Enderlin — view source — reply

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Hello Marco,

Actually, you are trying to access to something that does not exist, so
you get a null value. This part is logical. However, yes, a notice would
be welcomed except it may be skipped for historical reasons I reckon.
Probably to work well with isset or similar scenario.

Cheers.

Hello,

I just stumbled upon behavior that seems to "fail silently" regardless of
its very questionable validity:

<?php

$a = 1;

var_dump($a[123]); // NULL, no notice

https://3v4l.org/b3rDr

Are there specific reasons why no notice is thrown? Is it by design? If so,
does anyone remember why?

I haven't checked if this affects other types too. I know that an
assignment to an array key of a non-array would cause a cast of the value
to array, but a mere read operation should surely cause a notice to be
raised in the above scenario.

Cheers,

Marco Pivetta

http://twitter.com/Ocramius

http://ocramius.github.com/

10 years ago by Christoph Becker — view source — reply

unread

I just stumbled upon behavior that seems to "fail silently" regardless of
its very questionable validity:

<?php

$a = 1;

var_dump($a[123]); // NULL, no notice

https://3v4l.org/b3rDr

Are there specific reasons why no notice is thrown? Is it by design? If so,
does anyone remember why?

I haven't checked if this affects other types too. I know that an
assignment to an array key of a non-array would cause a cast of the value
to array, but a mere read operation should surely cause a notice to be
raised in the above scenario.

For the record: there are several bug reports/feature requests regarding
this issue, e.g. https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=37676.

--
Christoph M. Becker

10 years ago by Kalle Sommer Nielsen — view source — reply

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On Apr 12, 2016 15:02, "Ivan Enderlin" ivan.enderlin@hoa-project.net
wrote:

Hello Marco,

Actually, you are trying to access to something that does not exist, so
you get a null value. This part is logical. However, yes, a notice would be
welcomed except it may be skipped for historical reasons I reckon. Probably
to work well with isset or similar scenario.

Isset works regardless, because it is implemented as a language construct.

But on topic, then yes, it should emit a notice.

Cheers.

Hello,

I just stumbled upon behavior that seems to "fail silently" regardless of
its very questionable validity:

<?php

$a = 1;

var_dump($a[123]); // NULL, no notice

https://3v4l.org/b3rDr

Are there specific reasons why no notice is thrown? Is it by design? If
so,
does anyone remember why?

I haven't checked if this affects other types too. I know that an
assignment to an array key of a non-array would cause a cast of the value
to array, but a mere read operation should surely cause a notice to be
raised in the above scenario.

Cheers,

Marco Pivetta

http://twitter.com/Ocramius

http://ocramius.github.com/