Class "destructors"?

[Anon]

Hey all -

Yeah, the topic's the main idea here; I know it sounds dumb. But I've got a class that loads session variables into class variables and then modifies them in many of its functions. (I did that to avoid writing to session on every little modification.) Once all the other PHP code is evaluated, I'd like the class to store its updated variables back into session.

Right now I just call a class function called save_session(), but an automatic class destructor would help to decouple the PHP code page from the objects it uses. I would like folks to be able to use the object on their own pages, but then they've always got to remember to call that function as the last PHP call they make on the object.

So, would polling for destructors be feasible/efficient for PHP to do? It seems like it wouldn't be too big a deal. Course, I don't know if there'd be other purposes other than my relatively esoteric one. =)

-Jeremy

[Anon]

Destructors are for releasing dynamically allocated memory in C++. Sure, there are other uses, but none so critical or as applicable. We don't need destructors in PHP.

It's moot anyway, because PHP remembers changes to registered session variables automagically. Perhaps you've coded your class to avoid this.

--Steve

[Anon]

Yes, I know the purpose of destructors in C++; that's why I put the term in quotes in the subject heading. Obviously, the web application programmer isn't going to be managing memory allocation, but I wanted to emphasize the superficial characteristic, rather than the purpose, of destructors. That is, they're functions that are automatically called upon destruction of an object. In PHP, that's essentially analogous to when processing ends for a particular page view.

In general, my point is that they could still be responsible for "cleaning up" to achieve certain end conditions for an object after it's been used for all other purposes. Of course, this doesn't have to do with memory allocation, but rather for any of a number of esoteric purposes (only a few of which I've stumbled upon).

The problem, I guess, is that they're esoteric. I've definitely got a purpose, but I'm probably the only one. =)

-Jeremy