On Wed, Sep 23, 2015 at 12:27 PM, Rowan Collins <rowan.coll...@gmail.com>
wrote:
>
>
> My suggestion (with which I believe Stig was agreeing) is this:
>
> variable_exists('foo'): yes (should be yes)
> unset($foo);
> variable_exists('foo'): no (should be no)
> variable_exists('bar'): no (should be no)
>
> I dislike this because it makes refactoring harder. Just like when we
rename a dynamic property, we have to search for its usage as a string
(which may be stored in a variable), and then analyze if those strings
warrant being changed. Of course, strings in a variable may also be created
dynamically, so simply searching for the name of a property being renamed
may not find you all its usages.This feels like exactly the type of thing you were trying to avoid when you suggested hasitem() since you pass it a compound variable expression ($var->prop, $var['key']) which makes refactoring easier. I would prefer seeing both take actual expressions, much like isset and empty. Basically, if variable_exists recurses then its an error and if hasitem doesn't recurse its an error.
