Vadim Dvorovenko <[email protected]>: > Sorry for raising such an ancient topic. > > Аccidentally noticed, that construction like > `$arr['undefined']?->foo()->bar` causes error, and not behaves the same, > as `($arr['undefined'] ?? null)?->foo()->bar`. > > Readed docs, https://wiki.php.net/rfc/nullsafe_operator, asked google > and learned, that there were much discussions about such behavior, and > it was chosen deliberately. Nevertheless, structures like > `(($arr['undefined'] ?? null)?->foo()->bar)` does not looks pretty for > me. `$arr['undefined']->foo->bar ?? null` works great, until function > calls appears in chain, and `$arr['undefined']->foo()->bar ?? null` > breaks. It looks like objects are our favorites for short and safe > operations, but arrays are not. > > But during development, you can equally easily encounter typed arrays > (for example, with a structure described through phpdocs), and working > directly with properties, and traditional getters. An structured > associative array that has optional fields is also a common pattern. And > in large projects these patterns they can be found in almost any > combination. > > So it looks like the language needs a construct for pretty code in such > cases. What do you think it should look like? > > * Make nullsafe operator to be coalescing too. Making > `$arr['undefined']?->foo()->bar` no to cause error, but return null > > * Some new coalescing-nullsafe-operator, `??->`. > `$arr['undefined']??->foo()->bar` suppressing all errors to the left > same way `??` does. > > * Some new nullsafe-array-access operator `$arr?-['key']`. This leads to > `$arr?-['key']->foo()->bar` for cases where we are sure that array has > key. Supposed short-circuiting working here too. > > * Some new coalesce-array-access operators `$arr??-['key']`. Making > `$arr??-['key']->foo()->bar` for cases, there we are not sure, that > array has key. > > * Suppress function call on nulls and undefined errors in > `$var->foo()->bar() ?? null`. >
Hi, Vadim! I've seen discussions about that and also considered proposing something similar, so thank you for bringing that up! I see two questions here: 1. Accessing an array offset on a nullable value ($arrayOrNull['offset']) 2. Treating a non-existent array offset as null ($objects[0]?->prop) For the first case, the syntax could be symmetric to ?->: ? + -> = ?-> ? + [$offset] = ?[$offset] $arrayOrNull?['offset'] , equivalent to $arrayOrNull === null ? null : $arrayOrNull['offset'] For the second case: $objects[?0]?->prop , equivalent to ($objects[0] ?? null)?->prop -- Valentin
