Question

How this stuff works?

$object->foo1()->foo2()->foo3();

I’m working in Magento php framework. In Magento functions are called as sequence.But, I don’t understand how it works.Can anyone explain.

Answer 1

$object->foo1()->foo2()->foo3();

First, PHP will get a pointer to the foo1 method from the $object variable. It calls this method, which then returns another object. This second object (we shall call it $object2) has a method foo2(), which is also called. foo2() returns another object ($object3), which has a method foo3(), which returns whatever it likes.

In some cases, $object, $object2 and $object3 are just pointers to the same object. This means that you can keep calling methods on the same class in a nice sequence.

You can achieve this quite easily:

class Foo
{
    public function nicely()
    {
        return $this;
    }

    public function formatted()
    {
        return $this;
    }

    public function chained()
    {
        return $this;
    }

    public function calls()
    {
        return $this;
    }
}

$foo = new Foo();
$foo->nicely()->formatted()->chained()->calls();