Interactive shell doesn't complete property names
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Description
Description
According to the documentation:
The interactive shell also features tab completion for functions, constants, class names, variables, static method calls and class constants.
Only function, class and method names seems to be completing when hitting the TAB key.
Also, the completion is not contextualized: after $, it should be only variable names (not function and class names), and after -> it should be only property and method names of the current object.
The following command to run the interactive shell:
php -a
Completion of variable name
The following shell code:
php > $container = 'hello';
php > $co [⇥TAB]
Resulted in this output:
Collator collator_get_strength constant
collator_asort collator_set_attribute convert_uudecode
collator_compare collator_set_strength convert_uuencode
collator_create collator_sort copy
collator_get_attribute collator_sort_with_sort_keys cos
collator_get_error_code compact cosh
collator_get_error_message CompileError count
collator_get_locale connection_aborted count_chars
collator_get_sort_key connection_status Countable
But I expected this output instead:
$container
Completion of property name
The following shell code:
php > $object = (object) ['foo' => 'bar'];
php > $object->fo [⇥TAB]
Resulted in this output:
fopen forward_static_call forward_static_call_array
But I expected this output instead:
foo
PHP version
PHP 8.4.3 (cli) (built: Jan 15 2025 01:03:17) (NTS)
Copyright (c) The PHP Group
Built by Homebrew
Zend Engine v4.4.3, Copyright (c) Zend Technologies
with Xdebug v3.4.1, Copyright (c) 2002-2025, by Derick Rethans
with Zend OPcache v8.4.3, Copyright (c), by Zend Technologies
PHP Version
PHP 8.4.3
Operating System
Mac 15.3 (24D60)
Contributor guide
First steps
- Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
- Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
- Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
- Open a pull request that references the issue number.
Research direction
Start by running php -a and reproducing the variable and property completion examples from the issue. Trace the interactive shell's completion entry point and determine how the current candidates are selected. Done means $co completes only $container and $object->fo completes foo, with the documented completion behavior preserved.
Written by the indexing model from the issue text.
Assessment
- Tech stack
- php
- Domain
- cli
- Issue type
- Bug
- Difficulty
- 4/5
- Estimated time
- 3-5 days
- Activity status
- Quiet
- Clarity
- Mostly clear
- Newbie friendliness
- 45/100