how do i avoid typing the keyword "$this->" every time inside a class

[Joseph S.]

Hi all,
how do I avoid typing the keyword "$this->" every time I need to
reference a member of a class inside the class?

(coming from a world of cozy auto-complete enabled Java / .Net IDEs I
find it a bit annoying)

TIA,
JS

[Miguel Cruz]

Re: how do i avoid typing the keyword "$this->" every time inside a class

"Joseph S." <js_dev@rediffm ail.comwrote:

how do I avoid typing the keyword "$this->" every time I need to
reference a member of a class inside the class?

Set up a function key macro in your editor?

miguel
--
Photos from 40 countries on 5 continents: http://travel.u.nu
Latest photos: Malaysia; Thailand; Singapore; Spain; Morocco
Airports of the world: http://airport.u.nu

[mootmail-googlegroups@yahoo.com]

Re: how do i avoid typing the keyword &quot;$this-&gt;&quot; every time inside a class

Joseph S. wrote:

Hi all,
how do I avoid typing the keyword "$this->" every time I need to
reference a member of a class inside the class?
>
(coming from a world of cozy auto-complete enabled Java / .Net IDEs I
find it a bit annoying)
>
TIA,
JS

For what it's worth, I use Zend studio, and with it's autocomplete,
typing $t is usually enough to get $this as the first entry in most
cases.

I agree, though, that it can get a bit tedious after a while in any
decent sized class.

[Kenneth Downs]

Re: how do i avoid typing the keyword &quot;$this-&gt;&quot; every time inside a class

Joseph S. wrote:

Hi all,
how do I avoid typing the keyword "$this->" every time I need to
reference a member of a class inside the class?
>
(coming from a world of cozy auto-complete enabled Java / .Net IDEs I
find it a bit annoying)
>

back when the world was young, in foxpro we would do this:

WITH THIS
.property1 = 'value'
.property2 = 'value'

ENDWITH

AFAIK this language element does not exist in PHP.

--
Kenneth Downs
Secure Data Software, Inc.
(Ken)nneth@(Sec )ure(Dat)a(.com )

[Jerry Stuckle]

Re: how do i avoid typing the keyword &quot;$this-&gt;&quot; every time insidea class

Joseph S. wrote:

Hi all,
how do I avoid typing the keyword "$this->" every time I need to
reference a member of a class inside the class?
>
(coming from a world of cozy auto-complete enabled Java / .Net IDEs I
find it a bit annoying)
>
TIA,
JS
>

Unfortunately, you can't.

$this->foo is a class variable.

$foo is a local variable.

--
=============== ===
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attgl obal.net
=============== ===

[s a n j a y]

Re: how do i avoid typing the keyword &quot;$this-&gt;&quot; every time insidea class

Joseph S. wrote:

Hi all,
how do I avoid typing the keyword "$this->" every time I need to
reference a member of a class inside the class?
>
(coming from a world of cozy auto-complete enabled Java / .Net IDEs I
find it a bit annoying)
>
TIA,
JS
>

I usually copy paste it, or use those column select (aka block select)
feature of good editors for multiple lines. Edit plus comes to mind.

[dawnerd]

Re: how do i avoid typing the keyword &quot;$this-&gt;&quot; every time inside a class


s a n j a y wrote:

Joseph S. wrote:

Hi all,
how do I avoid typing the keyword "$this->" every time I need to
reference a member of a class inside the class?

(coming from a world of cozy auto-complete enabled Java / .Net IDEs I
find it a bit annoying)

TIA,
JS

>
I usually copy paste it, or use those column select (aka block select)
feature of good editors for multiple lines. Edit plus comes to mind.

I usually just type it, it is just a few extra characters. It doesn't
take up that much time, unless you type very slowly...

[william.clarke]

Re: how do i avoid typing the keyword &quot;$this-&gt;&quot; every time inside a class

Why not get an editor with autocomplete... have a look at PHPed, Zend
Studio and lots of the other IDEs out there.
When I started doing Java I did it in the "cosy" Notepad IDE with a
command line JDK compiler, so strangely autocomplete didn't work there
either. If your tools aren't doing the job, find better tools instead
of looking for shortcuts in the language ;)

[william.clarke]

Re: how do i avoid typing the keyword &quot;$this-&gt;&quot; every time inside a class

Sorry should have posted links:

PhpED: http://www.nusphere.com/products/phped.htm
Zend: http://www.zend.com/products/zend_studio/feature_list

Obviously neither of these is free, but you could try Eclipse with a
Php add-on.

[Joseph S.]

Re: how do i avoid typing the keyword &quot;$this-&gt;&quot; every time inside a class

Hi all,
first, thanks for all the replies.
(1)

>Unfortunatel y, you can't.
>$this->foo is a class variable.
>$foo is a local variable.
>============== ====
>Remove the "x" from my email address
>Jerry Stuckle

ok. Thinking of it, IMHO, this is a big excuse we (PHP community) give
to show minus points about PHP - Refer to

http://groups.google.co.in/group/comp.lang.php/browse_thread/thread/b9260666509a9c36/5369d366737bb9d3?lnk=st&q=&rnum=1#5369d366737bb9d3

(2)
william.clarke wrote:

Sorry should have posted links:
PhpED: http://www.nusphere.com/products/phped.htm
Zend: http://www.zend.com/products/zend_studio/feature_list
Obviously neither of these is free, but you could try Eclipse with a Php add-on.

I am using PHPEclipse for a long time now, (but wrote all my code in
procedural style, not touching OOP) - but it pops up huge autocomplete
list, and somehow, no "$this" - i'll have to look at the configuration
- (thanks anyway)

(3)
My own personal opinion is as follows:
if not for the "$" and the "->", PHP would have _eaten_ up a lot more
of the market share - that it is already doing so is not surprising. It
is simply the easiest language to work in. Lots of flexibility,
plethora of well designed functions and a very pratical approach,
rather than the purist apporach of Java/.Net designers which result in
more code being required to be written to accomplish simple tasks -
most obvious examples are file() and file_get/put_contents().

A Google summer of code project promises something interesting PHP
Preprocessor Macros:

http://code.google.com/soc/php/appinfo.html?csaid=3752FBA8CFFCD528

Finally, as a practical workaround, maybe a simple global function
could be written, say, function v($arg){
return (eval("\$this->".variable_nam e($arg));
}
I am looking for the function variable_name() . Looked around a bit, but
could not find one.

Or better still, one could write a slightly complex parsing script, say
code-cleaner.php, send original code to that script
(PHP in CLI mode:)
php -n code-cleaner.php myscript.php

which will do all the substitution and overwrite myscript.php with
"$this->" code.
I'll try this and post it if it succeeds.

One of the important things here is that PHP allows two $foo variables
in one class:
$foo = 5;
class A{
public $foo = 6;
public function showfoo(){
echo $foo; // 6
echo $this->foo; // 5
}
}
and that is why $this is required. I believe (please correct if wrong)
other languages give errors like "$foo is ambiguous". I dont know as
much of compiler internals as to know why $this-is required
_everywhere_.
This should have gone into PHP5, really, during the huge OOP rewrite.

Meanwhile,
people could have a look at

http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.php/browse_thread/thread/deea8ea577378c21/d0af228658807cee?lnk=gst&q=how+to+get+name+of+variable+from+reference&rnum=3#d0af228658807cee

which shows how to get the name of a variable.

Regards,
JS.

[Richard Levasseur]

Re: how do i avoid typing the keyword &quot;$this-&gt;&quot; every time inside a class


Joseph S. wrote:

(2)
william.clarke wrote:

Sorry should have posted links:
PhpED: http://www.nusphere.com/products/phped.htm
Zend: http://www.zend.com/products/zend_studio/feature_list
Obviously neither of these is free, but you could try Eclipse with a Php add-on.

I am using PHPEclipse for a long time now, (but wrote all my code in
procedural style, not touching OOP) - but it pops up huge autocomplete
list, and somehow, no "$this" - i'll have to look at the configuration
- (thanks anyway)
>

The PHP plugin for eclipse is mediocre at best. I find I fight it most
of the time:

1) New lines within quoted strings: it will auto end the line and make
it concatenate, but PHP will allow returns within the line, VERY
annoying when you're writing quoted HTML attributes within a HEREDOC
block.
2) Very poor autocomplete compared to other programs. $this-pops up
a huge list of potential matches. using built in functions will only
display the parameter list until you start the parentheses, in which
case it starts suggesting variables, which usually start with the super
globals. VERY frustrating.
3) Aggresive auto-formatting:
* Auto-inserts closing } after a { even if it is within a closed block
that it, itself, closed, creating a syntax error.
* The opening of a block with { will begin to suggest variables, and
pressing enter will auto-insert the first variable, which is usually
$_GET.
* Auto-complete of variables is iffy, too often has i tried to use
auto-complete, typed the first few characters, tab'd, and it only left
those characters instead of completing the variable name, even if it
was the only variable available.
4) Poor scope detection: it frequently suggests global variables that
aren't declared as global within the scope, thus would be inaccessible.
5) Poor auto-complete of auto-globals. Dreamweaver will display an
autocomplete for variables within $_SERVER, which is very handy. PHP
Eclipse won't.
6) No concept of current type of variable (If you've use vs.php, the
php plugin for the visual studio, you know what i mean - it can
somewhat accurately guess the type of a variable).
7) Poor help tips, see (2). You can document all your methods with
@param, @return, but you'll never see these comments from auto-complete
unless you manually hover your mouse over the method...defeat ing the
point of a context help as you type.
8) I could go on, but i think this is enough.

If you can get a hold of the visual studio IDE, try the vs.php plugin.
I find it vastly superior to eclipse's

(3)
My own personal opinion is as follows:
if not for the "$" and the "->", PHP would have _eaten_ up a lot more
of the market share - that it is already doing so is not surprising. It
is simply the easiest language to work in. Lots of flexibility,
plethora of well designed functions and a very pratical approach,
rather than the purist apporach of Java/.Net designers which result in
more code being required to be written to accomplish simple tasks -
most obvious examples are file() and file_get/put_contents().
>

Why? I don't see how $ and -has much effect on the market share.

A Google summer of code project promises something interesting PHP
Preprocessor Macros:

http://code.google.com/soc/php/appinfo.html?csaid=3752FBA8CFFCD528

>
Finally, as a practical workaround, maybe a simple global function
could be written, say, function v($arg){
return (eval("\$this->".variable_nam e($arg));
}
I am looking for the function variable_name() . Looked around a bit, but
could not find one.
>
Or better still, one could write a slightly complex parsing script, say
code-cleaner.php, send original code to that script
(PHP in CLI mode:)
php -n code-cleaner.php myscript.php
>
which will do all the substitution and overwrite myscript.php with
"$this->" code.
I'll try this and post it if it succeeds.
>
One of the important things here is that PHP allows two $foo variables
in one class:
$foo = 5;
class A{
public $foo = 6;
public function showfoo(){
echo $foo; // 6
echo $this->foo; // 5
}
}
and that is why $this is required. I believe (please correct if wrong)
other languages give errors like "$foo is ambiguous". I dont know as
much of compiler internals as to know why $this-is required
_everywhere_.

In PHP you have to qualify class/instance variables with $this or
classname::, if it isn't, its considered a local variable, more or less
(exceptions being 'global $var' and super globals)
In most languages, there's a heirarchy of scope. In general, most
specific overrides least specific:

If we were to consider some sort of php/java/c++ hybrid:
$foo = '3';
class bar {
public $foo = '2';
function baz($foo='1';) {
$foo // local variable, 1
$this.$foo // instance, 2
$GLOBALS['foo'] // global variable, 3
}
}

in java, you can do:

class bar {
public name;
void myfunc(String name) {
name = "John"; // refers to local name
this.name = "Mary"; // refers to instance name
}
}

Most languages have that sort of heirarchy, anyways.

And in response to original poster: Just use $this->, its not that much
of a hassle.
If you dont' like typing $this-before every var, just do $myvar = &
$this->myvar; at the start of the method.

[mootmail-googlegroups@yahoo.com]

Re: how do i avoid typing the keyword &quot;$this-&gt;&quot; every time inside a class


Richard Levasseur wrote:

>
Why? I don't see how $ and -has much effect on the market share.

I don't think it really does, either, but I just have to question the
wisdom of choosing the "->" over something like, say ".", which as you
said later in your post, some other languages have.

A "." is quick, simple, one keystroke, and my finger is right near that
key anyway.
A "->", on the other hand, requires me to move a finger to the numeric
row, then hold shift and hit another key (3 keystrokes vs 1).

As you mentioned, many other languages require scoping of class
variables vs local variables via a 'this', I think PHP just compounds
the issue with its choice of "->".

Yes, it's nice that it looks like an arrow and all, but can we leave
the ASCII art to the kiddies and instead make a language that favors
speed in writeability?