Constants
We need an eighth magic constant, something along the lines of __STATIC__. This should return the name of the class from which a static method was called, regardless of where in the inheritance tree the method was defined.
PHP 5.3 has the new use of the static keyword which will help, but it isn't perfect. You still have to repeat yourself frequently.
For example, trying to implement Active Record:
<?php
// In PHP 5.3
class Model
{
public static function find()
{
echo static::$class;
}
}
class Product extends Model
{
protected static $class = __CLASS__;
}
class User extends Model
{
protected static $class = __CLASS__;
}
Product::find(); // "Product"
User::find(); // "User"
?>
<?php
// With __STATIC__ keyword. (Would be better.)
class Model
{
public static function find()
{
echo __STATIC__;
}
}
class Product extends Model {}
class User extends Model {}
Product::find(); // "Product"
User::find(); // "User"
?>
Magic constants
PHP provides a large number of predefined constants to any script which it runs. Many of these constants, however, are created by various extensions, and will only be present when those extensions are available, either via dynamic loading or because they have been compiled in.
There are seven magical constants that change depending on where they are used. For example, the value of __LINE__ depends on the line that it's used on in your script. These special constants are case-insensitive and are as follows:
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| __LINE__ | The current line number of the file. |
| __FILE__ | The full path and filename of the file. If used inside an include, the name of the included file is returned. Since PHP 4.0.2, __FILE__ always contains an absolute path with symlinks resolved whereas in older versions it contained relative path under some circumstances. |
| __DIR__ | The directory of the file. If used inside an include, the directory of the included file is returned. This is equivalent to dirname(__FILE__). This directory name does not have a trailing slash unless it is the root directory. (Added in PHP 5.3.0.) |
| __FUNCTION__ | The function name. (Added in PHP 4.3.0) As of PHP 5 this constant returns the function name as it was declared (case-sensitive). In PHP 4 its value is always lowercased. |
| __CLASS__ | The class name. (Added in PHP 4.3.0) As of PHP 5 this constant returns the class name as it was declared (case-sensitive). In PHP 4 its value is always lowercased. |
| __METHOD__ | The class method name. (Added in PHP 5.0.0) The method name is returned as it was declared (case-sensitive). |
| __NAMESPACE__ | The name of the current namespace (case-sensitive). This constant is defined in compile-time (Added in PHP 5.3.0). |
See also get_class(), get_object_vars(), file_exists() i function_exists().
add a note
User Contributed NotesMagic constants
me at jamessocol dot com
25-Jun-2008 06:11
25-Jun-2008 06:11
php at kennel17 dot co dot uk
20-Jun-2007 07:29
20-Jun-2007 07:29
Further to my previous note, the 'object' element of the array can be used to get the parent object. So changing the get_class_static() function to the following will make the code behave as expected:
<?php
function get_class_static() {
$bt = debug_backtrace();
if (isset($bt[1]['object']))
return get_class($bt[1]['object']);
else
return $bt[1]['class'];
}
?>
HOWEVER, it still fails when being called statically. Changing the last two lines of my previous example to
<?php
foo::printClassName();
bar::printClassName();
?>
...still gives the same problematic result in PHP5, but in this case the 'object' property is not set, so that technique is unavailable.
php at kennel17 dot co dot uk
20-Jun-2007 06:12
20-Jun-2007 06:12
In response to stangelanda at gmail dot com, (who suggested a possible fix to get the actual class name of the object, when being called statically).
in PHP5, this fix no longer works.
Here is some example code:
<?php
function get_class_static() {
$bt = debug_backtrace();
$name = $bt[1]['class'];
return $name;
}
class foo {
function printClassName() {
print(get_class_static() . "<br>");
}
}
class bar extends foo {
}
$f = new foo();
$b = new bar();
$f->printClassName();
$b->printClassName();
?>
In PHP4, it outputs
foo
bar
as you described.
However, in PHP5, due to the way the debug_backtrace() function has been modified (see http://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=30828) the output is now
foo
foo
I have yet to figure out a way to get the original output in PHP5. Any suggestions would be very useful, and if I find an answer I'll post it here.
Tomek Perlak [tomekperlak at tlen pl]
10-Nov-2006 11:16
10-Nov-2006 11:16
The __CLASS__ magic constant nicely complements the get_class() function.
Sometimes you need to know both:
- name of the inherited class
- name of the class actually executed
Here's an example that shows the possible solution:
<?php
class base_class
{
function say_a()
{
echo "'a' - said the " . __CLASS__ . "<br/>";
}
function say_b()
{
echo "'b' - said the " . get_class($this) . "<br/>";
}
}
class derived_class extends base_class
{
function say_a()
{
parent::say_a();
echo "'a' - said the " . __CLASS__ . "<br/>";
}
function say_b()
{
parent::say_b();
echo "'b' - said the " . get_class($this) . "<br/>";
}
}
$obj_b = new derived_class();
$obj_b->say_a();
echo "<br/>";
$obj_b->say_b();
?>
The output should look roughly like this:
'a' - said the base_class
'a' - said the derived_class
'b' - said the derived_class
'b' - said the derived_class
stangelanda at gmail dot com
06-Sep-2006 06:17
06-Sep-2006 06:17
claude noted that __CLASS__ always contains the class that it is called in, if you would rather have the class that called the method use get_class($this) instead. However this only works with instances, not when called statically.
<?php
class A {
function showclass() {
echo get_class($this);
}
}
class B extends A {}
$a = new A();
$b = new B();
$a->showclass();
$b->showclass();
A::showclass();
B::showclass();
//results in "a", "b", false, false
?>
I tried keeping track of the class manually within the properties, but the following doesn't work either:
<?php
class A {
var $class = __CLASS__;
function showclass() {
echo $this->class;
}
}
class B extends A {
var $class = __CLASS__;
}
//results in "a", "b", NULL, NULL
?>
The best solution I could come up with was using debug_backtrace. I assume there is a better way somehow, but I can't find it. However the following works:
<?php
class A {
function showclass() {
$backtrace = debug_backtrace();
echo $backtrace[0]['class'];
}
}
class B extends A {}
//results in "a", "b", "a", "b"
?>
warhog at warhog dot net
18-Dec-2005 10:33
18-Dec-2005 10:33
There is another magic constant not mentioned above: __COMPILER_HALT_OFFSET__ - contains where the compiler halted - see http://www.php.net/manual/function.halt-compiler.php for further information.
vijaykoul_007 at rediffmail dot com
22-Sep-2005 06:59
22-Sep-2005 06:59
the difference between
__FUNCTION__ and __METHOD__ as in PHP 5.0.4 is that
__FUNCTION__ returns only the name of the function
while as __METHOD__ returns the name of the class alongwith the name of the function
class trick
{
function doit()
{
echo __FUNCTION__;
}
function doitagain()
{
echo __METHOD__;
}
}
$obj=new trick();
$obj->doit();
output will be ---- doit
$obj->doitagain();
output will be ----- trick::doitagain
karl __at__ streetlampsoftware__dot__com
03-Mar-2005 10:39
03-Mar-2005 10:39
Note that the magic constants cannot be included in quoted strings.
For instance,
echo "This is the filename: __FILE__";
will return exactly what's typed above.
echo "This is the filename: {__FILE__}";
will also return what's typed above.
The only way to get magic constants to parse in strings is to concatenate them into strings:
echo "This is the filename: ".__FILE__;
csaba at alum dot mit dot edu
03-Mar-2005 01:04
03-Mar-2005 01:04
Sometimes you might want to know whether a script is the top level script or whether it has been included. That could be useful if you want to reuse the routines in another script, but you don't want to separate them out. Here's a way that seems to be working for me (for both Apache2 module and CLI versions of PHP) on my Win XP Pro system.
By the way, if __FILE__ is within a function call, its value corresponds to the file it was defined in and not the file that it was called from. Also, I used $script and strtolower instead of realpath because if the script is deleted after inclusion but before realpath is called (which could happen if the test is deferred), then realpath would return empty since it requires an extant file or directory.
Csaba Gabor from Vienna
<?php
if (amIincluded()) return; // if we're included we only want function defs
function amIincluded() {
// returns true/false depending on whether the currently
// executing script is included or not
// Don't put this function in an include file (duh)!
$webP = !!$_SERVER['REQUEST_METHOD']; // a web request?
$script = preg_replace('/\//',DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR,
$_SERVER['SCRIPT_FILENAME']);
return ($webP) ? (strtolower(__FILE__)!=strtolower($script)) :
!array_key_exists("_REQUEST", $GLOBALS);
}
?>
lm arobase bible point ch
08-Dec-2004 11:17
08-Dec-2004 11:17
in reply to x123 at bestof dash inter:
I believe, this is not a bug, but a feature.
__FILE__ returns the name of the include file, while $PHP_SELF returns the relative name of the main file.
It is then easy to get the file name only with substr(strrchr($PHP_SELF,'/'),1)
claude at NOSPAM dot claude dot nl
18-Jul-2004 05:29
18-Jul-2004 05:29
Note that __CLASS__ contains the class it is called in; in lowercase. So the code:
class A
{
function showclass()
{
echo __CLASS__;
}
}
class B extends A
{
}
$a = new A();
$b = new B();
$a->showclass();
$b->showclass();
A::showclass();
B::showclass();
results in "aaaa";
warhog at warhog dot net
06-Feb-2004 09:49
06-Feb-2004 09:49
just to read out the filename of the currently proceeded file use
<?php basename(__FILE__); ?>
hixon at colorado dot edu
16-May-2003 02:21
16-May-2003 02:21
You can use the following in files that you want to include, but not run directly. The script will exit if it's run as the top-level script, but will not exit if it's included from another script. Of course this won't work in the command line mode.
if (realpath(__FILE__) == realpath($_SERVER['SCRIPT_FILENAME'])) {
exit;
}
kop at meme dot com
14-Feb-2003 12:34
14-Feb-2003 12:34
The keywords TRUE and FALSE (case insensitive), which represent their respective boolean values, are worth noting here.
darwin[at]buchner[dot]net
15-Mar-2002 01:54
15-Mar-2002 01:54
As of version 4.0.6, there is also a handy predefined DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR constant which you can use to make you scripts more portatable between OS's with different directory structures.