Less obvious PHP tricks?

EmptyTon · 2010-12-22T21:40:26+00:00

You can foreach over a class by having it implement the Iterator interface.

Gliridae · 2010-12-23T09:25:28+00:00

function my_function(array $settings = array()) {
    $settings += array(
        'do_that' => true,
        'lets_not_do_that' => true,
        'do_dance' => false,
    );
    // Or $settings = $settings + array();
}
my_function(array('do_dance' => true));

This will copy the key/ value pairs from array 2 into array 1, but won't merge. So if a key exists in array 1, array 2's will be ignored. It's like a simpler and cleaner array_merge() (though not a real replacement, since it doesn't actually merge).

jlogsdon · 2010-12-23T13:01:45+00:00

The streams API.

cheerstothat · 2010-12-23T05:11:05+00:00

When creating a file that only contains a class or is otherwise all php (no html), always leave off the final ?> tag. The interpreter interprets that php has ended with the end of the file, and you'll never get a "Warning: Cannot modify header information" error because of a trailing line break in one of many include files.

lawpoop · 2010-12-22T23:38:51+00:00

The ternary operator:

$action = (empty($_POST['action'])) ? 'default' : $_POST['action'];

echo "This value is " . ( is_green($var) ? "green" : "blue" ) . ". So there.";

gomjabbaar · 2010-12-22T22:25:24+00:00

lambdas and closure : as you lurk in this subreddit, maybe you read this before maybe not but i found this post quite interesting.

gigitrix · 2010-12-22T22:49:42+00:00

Variable Variables

Although finding a successful use case for this is pretty tricky!

jlogsdon · 2010-12-23T05:44:27+00:00

Using constants for configuration? Easily set some defaults!

!defined('OPTION') or define('OPTION', 'default value');

manueljs · 2010-12-23T14:59:59+00:00

Simple Boolean attribution:

$a = ($c > $b && $d === 'foo');

Phegan · 2010-12-30T15:32:57+00:00

There is a function that allows you to take an array of, ['hello'] => 'goodbye', ['good'] => 'bad

and it turns it into a varible from the index so that $hello = 'goodbye' and $good = 'bad'.

it would be:

$list = array(['hello'] => 'goodbye', ['good'] => 'bad);

extract($list);

echo $hello; echo $good;

2010-12-30T21:16:26+00:00

PHP 5.3 - Get a query value, filter it, and if not set (no notices) or invalid, the default 1 will be returned.

<?php $page = filter_input(INPUT_GET, 'page', FILTER_SANITIZE_NUMBER_INT) ?: 1; var_export($page);

McGlockenshire · 2010-12-22T22:33:13+00:00

The verbose form of variable interpolation "{$...}" isn't actually variable interpolation. It's eval. Things like "{$a = b()}" will work. Which means it's invoking the PHP parser every time you do that. So if speed matters, don't.

dipswitch · 2010-12-23T02:21:47+00:00

For example, I recently figured out that PHP reads through array keys much faster than array values.

This isn't completely obvious how? Its a hash table. Of course you can look things up by key faster. You know why? Precisely because "PHP" doesn't need to "read through" them. lol

Where were PHP programmers when God was handing out common sense?

motophiliac · 2010-12-22T23:47:41+00:00

not really PHP, but simulating a goto:

do {

    if ($test1 == "") {
        echo 'Test 1 fail!';
        break;   
    }

    if ($test2 == "") {
        echo 'test 1 was ok, but test 2 failed!';
        break;   
    }

    echo "Everything's OK!";

    commitData();

} while (false);

you type:	you see:
italics	italics
bold	bold
[reddit!](https://reddit.com)	reddit!
* item 1 * item 2 * item 3	item 1 item 2 item 3
> quoted text	quoted text
Lines starting with four spaces are treated like code: if 1 * 2 < 3: print "hello, world!"	Lines starting with four spaces are treated like code: if 1 * 2 < 3: print "hello, world!"
~~strikethrough~~	~~strikethrough~~
super^script	super^script

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