Just because something is being used widely does not make it right, nor should it be held up as a fine example of design. Language hacks like the one we're dis

Just because something is being used widely does not make it right, nor should it be held up as a fine example of design. Language hacks like the one we're discussing are fine IF: - You work with people who avoid bad features. - You can avoid using code that uses bad features (less of a problem, until you have to debug things and then you're in a world of hurt). - The features are not short-sighted hacks that prevent the language from moving forward (e.g., eliminate the opportunity to make things faster through dynamic compilation or whatever). Scheme is a great language that is not useful in the real world, while PHP is a terrible language that happens to be in wide use. Neither of these positions are unique, and honestly I'd much rather use a bad language with good tooling than a great language with poor support. But I will continue to point out PHP's flaws, which are many and just howling bad, and work towards improving the alternatives.