Can you pass Objects?

[mikey_w]

I only know procedural coding and PHP. I want to learn how to program like a professional programmer who knows Python or Java would code. I also want to learn OOP later this year.

One of the things that drives me crazy about my current PHP code is how messy I feel it is to pass data to a function.

For example, let’s say I have several attributes about a user that I need to manipulate. And I have to do this in 10 different scripts.

To make things more efficient, I want to create a function.

But the problem is I have to pass all of the individual attributes back and forth between my scripts and the function. (If you have 20 attributes this is a real PITA.)

In OOP or more sophisticated languages like Python or Java, isn’t there a way to define a “data structure” or “object” that would contain all 20 attributes, and then just pass that single entity to your function?

Right now in several scripts, I capture the user’s Timestamp, IP, Hostname, etc and I’d like to just pass that as a THING instead of having to pass each item separately.

s it stands now, I don’t feel inclined to write functions in my PHP to streamline things, because I feel it just transfers the pain from one thing to another. (Having to write tons of code to pass tons of attributes probably adds more code than I save by creating the new function!!)

Not sure if I am making any sense?!

[TomB]

Yes, it is.

class UserInfo {
	public $ip;
	public $hostname;
	public $timestamp;
}


function foo(UserInfo $user) {
	echo 'IP:' . $user->ip . '<br />';
	echo 'Host:' . $user->hostname . '<br />';
	echo 'Timestamp:' . $user->timestamp . '<br />';
}

$userinfo = new UserInfo;
$userinfo->ip = '2.2.2.2';
$userinfo->hostname = 'example.org';
$userinfo->timestamp = time();

foo($userinfo);

Keep in mind that you can also do this with an Array.

[mikey_w]

That’s some pretty neat code!

@TomB

Keep in mind that you can also do this with an Array.

Do you mean using OOP?

Also, can what you did be done with procedural code also?