constructors

[alain dhaene]

Hi,

Is it possible to have more constructors in the same class?

e.g

class person
{
function person($name)
{
}

function search($name,$a ge)
{
}

}


//make object

$person1 = new person("genesis ");
$person2 = new person("U2",40) ;

thx.

Alain

[Alain Dhaene]

Re: constructors

oeps,
That's wrong it must be:

class person[color=blue]
> {
> function person($name)
> {
> }
>
> function person($name,$a ge)
> {
> }
>
> }
> //make object
>
> $person1 = new person("genesis ");
> $person2 = new person("U2",40) ;
>
> thx.[/color]



"alain dhaene" <a.dhaene@instr uct.be> schreef in bericht
news:4014f103$0 $7036$ba620e4c@ news.skynet.be. ..[color=blue]
> Hi,
>
> Is it possible to have more constructors in the same class?
>
> e.g
>
> class person
> {
> function person($name)
> {
> }
>
> function search($name,$a ge)
> {
> }
>
> }
>
>
> //make object
>
> $person1 = new person("genesis ");
> $person2 = new person("U2",40) ;
>
> thx.
>
> Alain
>
>[/color]

[Berislav Lopac]

Re: constructors

alain dhaene wrote:[color=blue]
> Is it possible to have more constructors in the same class?[/color]

As I understand it, all methods in PHP follow the general functions rule,
which is that you can't redeclare a function. Unlike Java, where a method's
signature includes the arguments and the return type besides the name
itself, in PHP the "signature" is only the method's name.

However, you can "overload" a function by stating optional arguments, which
are defined in fuction definition, but can be avoided when calling the
function/method.

In your example, the constructor could be:

person($name, $age = NULL)

and your two example calls would work.

Berislav

[Jochen Buennagel]

Re: constructors

Berislav Lopac wrote:
[color=blue]
> In your example, the constructor could be:
>
> person($name, $age = NULL)
>
> and your two example calls would work.[/color]

If you need different kinds of arguments for different constructors
(e.g. person($name) and person($sex, $age)), you can also do the following:

class person {
function person(){
switch (func_num_args( )) {
case 1:
$this->name = func_get_arg(0) ;
break;
case 2:
$this->sex = func_get_arg(0) ;
$this->age = func_get_arg(1) ;
break;
default:
die ('wrong number of arguments for constructor');
}
}
}

You could further check the types of the arguments in different places,
e.g. if func_get_arg(0) is a string of "m" or "f", treat the call as
person($sex, $age), otherwise treat it as person($name, $age)

Jochen