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Comment by akavlie | Hacker News Reader

Cool. Now why doesn't PHP join the crowd and do this with arrays already?

I absolutely agree. The PHP array instantiation syntax is atrocious... I really dislike '=>'. While they're at it they might as well replace array() with [] and/or {}.

Yep, array() is the icing on the cake. Why is the most common data structure in the language instantiated with a function?

I could probably rant on PHP syntax all day long, but it's too off topic here.

It's technically a 'language construct', but it sure does seem like a function. Same with PHP's 'list'. It's not good syntax, in my opinion also. It doesn't even seem like syntax!

array() isn't a function, it's just PHP array literal syntax.

    $x = array("a" => 100); // legal
    $y = my_func("a" => 100); // illegal

Yeah, call_user_func('strlen', 'hello world') works but call_user_func('array', 'hello world') does not. But for ugly syntax, it's hard to beat the $ sigil being required everywhere for no reason at all (unlike Perl where it actually did something).

$vars remind me of programming mIRC.

You're right, I was a bit hasty and didn't consider that. It sure does look like a function though, where other languages typically use {} or something similar.

Let's throw in support for keyworded arguments while we're at it, too.

[NSArray arrayWithObject:notToMentionObjectiveC];

shudder

Having written and shipped 5+ iPhone apps written in the verbosphemy* that is ObjectiveC, I'm strongly looking forward to being able to do all future iPhone apps in a saner language like JavaScript or Python. If I do them at all. Ever again. In fact it's pretty much a hard requirement. Just after this current one ships.

(*: verbose + blasphemy)

To what end?

More elegant and easier to type syntax.

"This is your father's language sabre. A simpler syntax from a more elegant age."

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