phan / phan/phan

Some classes can be cast to string, but don't have __toString()

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enhancement
Dominant language
PHP
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Description

http://php.net/manual/en/tidy.parsestring.php#refsect1-tidy.parsestring-examples

Attempting to get a __toString() method will emit the following error.
Uncaught ReflectionException: Method tidy::__toString() does not exist in php shell code:1

This affects phan's analysis in a few edge cases.

One possibility is to enumerate classes that are exceptions to that rule. Attempting to cast object instances to strings and seeing which ones don't throw \Error will help with that.

Phan checks for the existence of __toString(), this check will have to account for classes such as tidy.

Contributor guide

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First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start by reproducing the tidy::__toString() ReflectionException from the linked PHP tidy.parseString example, then locate Phan's check for __toString(). Determine how castable classes such as tidy should be represented in that analysis; done means those edge cases no longer produce incorrect results.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
php
Domain
devtools
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
35/100

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