6 ms·

Parameter Hell

10 points by jon_kuperman 13y ago

NigelTufnel 13y ago
After six years of programming in Python I've almost forgot that there are languages that don't have named function parameters. I remember the horror of working with WINAPI. There are WINAPI functions with 10 or so arguments and I was using Delphi which as far as I remember had no support for dictionary literals, let alone named parameters.
- jon_kuperman 13y ago
  haha a friend just showed me named parameters in python! /jealous
krapp 13y ago
I've used to 'options as array' pattern in PHP plenty of times. While it's probably the closest thing to named parameters you can get in that language, it can get kind of ugly and clumsy when you have to validate it. function something(array $options, $defaults=array('foo'=>1,'bar'=>2)){ ...(array_intersect_key or something)... } Actual named parameters would work so much better. And Wordpress 'solves' this in the plugins API by suggesting using extract(), which converts an array into variables. Which is even worse.
- jon_kuperman 13y ago
  Absolutely, they would be the ideal answer but a lot of times this gets the job done better than just having 10 parameters to your function.
mlntn 13y ago
There is currently an RFC for named parameters in PHP 5.6. The spec looks good and I'm hoping it gets approved. https://wiki.php.net/rfc/named_params https://wiki.php.net/rfc/named_params
- jon_kuperman 13y ago
  Hadn't seen that, thanks for the share.
- RossM 13y ago
  There's been some recent discussion about this[0]. The RFC owner reckons it won't be ready in time for 5.6 (more like 5.7). [0]: http://markmail.org/message/wgdsntbsnojloxqd http://markmail.org/message/wgdsntbsnojloxqd
chaghalibaghali 13y ago
The problem with this approach is that you basically lose all IDE support and static code checking - it's a good solution in extreme cases, but I prefer not to use it as the default.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
mdxn 13y ago
Back in highschool, I wrote an Uno clone for a final project in Java. I ended up encountering a similar issue for when I was defining constructors for Card objects. At some point, I had to cast null as an Object to rid of some ambiguity. Still pretty embarrassed about it.
omervk 13y ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Builder_pattern http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Builder_pattern

10 points by jon_kuperman 13y ago

After six years of programming in Python I've almost forgot that there are languages that don't have named function parameters. I remember the horror of working with WINAPI. There are WINAPI functions with 10 or so arguments and I was using Delphi which as far as I remember had no support for dictionary literals, let alone named parameters.

jon_kuperman 13y ago
haha a friend just showed me named parameters in python! /jealous

krapp 13y ago

I've used to 'options as array' pattern in PHP plenty of times. While it's probably the closest thing to named parameters you can get in that language, it can get kind of ugly and clumsy when you have to validate it. function something(array $options, $defaults=array('foo'=>1,'bar'=>2)){ ...(array_intersect_key or something)... } Actual named parameters would work so much better. And Wordpress 'solves' this in the plugins API by suggesting using extract(), which converts an array into variables. Which is even worse.

jon_kuperman 13y ago
Absolutely, they would be the ideal answer but a lot of times this gets the job done better than just having 10 parameters to your function.

mlntn 13y ago

There is currently an RFC for named parameters in PHP 5.6. The spec looks good and I'm hoping it gets approved. https://wiki.php.net/rfc/named_params https://wiki.php.net/rfc/named_params

jon_kuperman 13y ago
Hadn't seen that, thanks for the share.
RossM 13y ago
There's been some recent discussion about this[0]. The RFC owner reckons it won't be ready in time for 5.6 (more like 5.7). [0]: http://markmail.org/message/wgdsntbsnojloxqd http://markmail.org/message/wgdsntbsnojloxqd

chaghalibaghali 13y ago

The problem with this approach is that you basically lose all IDE support and static code checking - it's a good solution in extreme cases, but I prefer not to use it as the default.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

mdxn 13y ago

Back in highschool, I wrote an Uno clone for a final project in Java. I ended up encountering a similar issue for when I was defining constructors for Card objects. At some point, I had to cast null as an Object to rid of some ambiguity. Still pretty embarrassed about it.

omervk 13y ago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Builder_pattern http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Builder_pattern