Personally I don't like having two ways of doing things. It makes it harder for people to read scripts.
However, I think the proposed syntax is significantly more elegant than today's array() which makes me think twice about the idea and possibly making an exception to the rule. I think it'll improve the look of PHP scripts. Also I think people calling methods using call_user_method([$obj, "method"]); will find it sexier than the array() syntax.
I guess I think it'd be interesting to see what other's think. Also, another point to check is if list() can also be converted into [] because having a hybrid wouldn't be too nice.
Andi
At 12:33 AM 11/5/2003 +0100, Christian Schneider wrote:
I propose to add an alternative (backward compatible) short array creation syntax:
$a = [ 1, 2, 3 ]; and $a = [ 'a' => 42, 'b' => "foo" ];
It can also be used in function calls: img(['src' => "logo.gif", 'alt' => "Logo"]);
Reason behind this change: Arrays are used a lot and should therefore have as little syntactic overhead as possible. And I think the short syntax is also easier to read and write.
A patch for the parser is trivial and is attached for Zend2.
Note: I checked the newsgroup archive but couldn't find a discussion about this. After not hearing back about my proposed enhancement to debug_backtrace() and the dangling comma for function call parameters being rejected I wonder if I'm using the right mailing list for this :-)
- Chris
Index: Zend/zend_language_parser.y
===================================================================
RCS file: /repository/ZendEngine2/zend_language_parser.y,v
retrieving revision 1.127
diff -u -r1.127 zend_language_parser.y
--- Zend/zend_language_parser.y 19 Oct 2003 08:38:48 -0000 1.127
+++ Zend/zend_language_parser.y 4 Nov 2003 23:32:12 -0000
@@ -581,6 +581,7 @@
| '@' { zend_do_begin_silence(&$1 TSRMLS_CC); } expr { zend_do_end_silence(&$1 TSRMLS_CC); $$ = $3; }
| scalar { $$ = $1; }
| T_ARRAY '(' array_pair_list ')' { $$ = $3; }
+ | '[' array_pair_list ']' { $$ = $2; }
| '`' encaps_list '`' { zend_do_shell_exec(&$$, &$2 TSRMLS_CC); }
| T_PRINT expr { zend_do_print(&$$, &$2 TSRMLS_CC); }
;
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