book

Upgrading to PHP 7

by Davey Shafik

October 2015

Intermediate to advanced

25 pages

1h 4m

English

O'Reilly Media, Inc.

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PHP 7 TimelineHow We Got HereRelease Cycle
Alternative PHP TagsPOSIX-Compatible Regular ExpressionsMigrating to Perl Compatible Regular ExpressionsMultiple Default Cases in SwitchesRemoval of the Original MySQL ExtensionMigrating to Procedural mysqliMigrating to an Object-Oriented APIUsing MysqliSummary
Consistency FixesNew SyntaxNew CombinationsNested double colonsNested Method and Function CallsArbitrary Expression DereferencingDereferencing scalarsFuture SyntaxBackward Compatibility IssuesSummary
OperatorsNull Coalesce OperatorCombined Comparison OperatorConstant ArraysUnpacking Objects Using list()New FunctionsInteger DivisionRegular ExpressionsCryptographically Secure ValuesFunction ChangesSessionsFiltered unserialize()Move Up Multiple Levels with dirname()Salts Deprecated in password_hash()Summary
ExpectationsSummary
Exceptions on Constructor FailureEngine ExceptionsException HierarchyError Exceptions\Error\AssertionError\ArithmeticError and \DivisionByZeroError\ParseError\TypeErrorCatchable Fatal Errors\Throwable and UserlandCalling Methods on non-objectsSummary
Unicode Codepoint Escape SyntaxNew Internationalization FeaturesWorking with Unicode CharactersSummary
Bind Closure On CallSummary
Generator Return ValuesGenerator DelegationSummary
Context-Sensitive LexerPHP 4 Constructors DeprecatedGroup Use DeclarationsAnonymous ClassesAnonymous Class NamesSummary

Scalar Type HintsCoercive TypesPrecision LossStrict TypesReturn Type HintsReserved Keywords for Future TypesSummary
Further ReadingOther Resources
Deprecated FeaturesUniform Variable SyntaxBasic Language ChangesOther RFCsExpectations and AssertionsError HandlingOther RFCsUnicode EnhancementsClosuresGeneratorsObject-Oriented ProgrammingType HintsInternals Changes

Overview

PHP 7—the most dramatic update to the language in over a decade—has arrived. This O’Reilly report provides you with a short guide to the major changes in this new release, including a revamped engine (Zend Engine 3), a bunch of new features, and lots of language cleanup. You’ll learn about basic language changes, deprecated features, Unicode enhancements, changes in Object-Oriented programming, and other enhancements.

You’ll also discover why it’s taken more than 10 years for the first new major version of PHP since PHP 5 to appear—and what happened to version 6 in the meantime.

Get important details regarding changes to PHP 7, including:

Deprecated features, starting with alternative PHP tags and POSIX-compatible regular expressions
Uniform Variable Syntax, including consistency fixes and new syntax
Basic language changes, such as new operators, constant arrays, new functions, and regular expressions
Expectations and Assertions
Error handling
Enhancements to PHP’s Unicode, closure, and Generator features
Changes in Object-Oriented programming
Scalar type hints (perhaps the most polarizing and exciting new feature)