What Does PHP 5.3 Mean for Drupal?

What Does PHP 5.3 Mean for Drupal? C.M. Lubinski Drupal Camp Chicago 2010-06-26

And you are . . . ? C.M. Lubinski • By Day: PHP Developer • By Night: Drupal Enthusiast • By Interest: Language Connoisseur • cmc on #cdmug

What's all this then? • New Features, Top Five-ish • Problems and Incompatibilities • Hopes and Realities of Drupal Core

Number Five: Garbage Collection PHP < 5.3 • Reference Counting • Does Not Catch Cyclic References • Example: Doubly-Linked List • Not a big problem for Drupal New Functions • gc_enable / gc_disable / gc_enabled • gc_collect_cycles

Number Four: Date/Time Changes DateInterval • Object with fields for each unit • DateTime->add/sub • DateTime->diff • Not as intelligent as one would hope DatePeriod • "Traversable" (i.e. foreach-able) • Constructors: • Start, Interval, Number of Occurrences • Start, Interval, End • ISO String

Number Three: New SPL Classes Data Structures • SplDoublyLinkedList • SplStack • SplQueue, SplPriorityQueue • SplHeap, SplMinHeap, SplMaxHeap • SplFixedArray Iterators • FilesystemIterator • GlobIterator • MultipleIterator • etc.

Number Two: Anonymous Functions and Closures Anonymous Function • A function that can be passed as a variable • An object which can be called Closure ("use") • An anonymous function with state • Cannot be serialized Use Cases • Anywhere a callback is needed • Sort • String Replacement • *Not* Drupal Menu Callbacks

Number One point Five: __invoke() • Treat an object as a function • Can be used as a callback • Serializable closure Use Cases • Factories • Track Generated Instances • Compound Function (e.g. SQL query) • Conciseness

Number One: Namespaces • Modularize Code • Can Alias a Namespace • class_name() includes absolute path • Offers OO Benefits Without Objects • Not Dynamic • Cannot • use 'Drupal\Modules\' . $module_name; • Can • $func = 'Drupal\Modules\' . $module_name . '\Hooks\menu';

But That's Not All! • PHAR, the PHP archive • MySQL driver is now native • ?: • Improvements to static classes/methods • array_replace • Faster! • Even more

Not Without Its Problems: GOTO goto 'beginning'; logic: the logical progression of the program. exit(); beginning: GOTO makes code goto 'stringy'; point: to the point where it's hard to understand goto 'logic'; stringy: needlessly unreadable goto 'point';

Incompatibilities: Ereg is Dead • Represents regular expressions for egrep • Defined in 1986 • Not as powerful (or fast) as preg_* • No \w, \s, etc. • No lazy evaluation • No "look-around"s • Converting is simple • Wrap previous regex is appropriate delimiter • split is also dead

Incompatibilities: By-Reference • Call-time pass-by-reference has been deprecated • Don't use references when calling functions • Except call_user_func_array • Caused many issues with D6 • allow_call_time_pass_reference in php.ini

5.3 and Drupal Core Drupal 6 • Still Supports PHP4 • Drupal >= 6.14 Supports PHP 5.3 • Contrib does not Drupal 7 • Requires PHP 5.2 • Contrib will have better support for 5.3 • Use the "php" option in module.info • "Mapper" functions will still be needed Drupal 8 • Here's Hoping

References, Questions and a Book http://us2.php.net/migration53http://drupal.org/node/360605 Thanks!CM Lubinskihttp://cmlubinski.info

What Does PHP 5.3 Mean for Drupal?