Question

I’m primarily a JS developer, using PHP for that server-side kick and I’m looking to see if there’s an method in PHP similar to the JS:

var something = {
    action1: function() { alert('Fire 1!'); },
    action2: function() { alert('Fire 2!'); },
    action3: function() { alert('Fire 3!'); }
}

Then allowing me to call like:

something.action2();  // Alerts 'Fire 2!'

It’s for a relatively small app I’m working on and I’d like to avoid building classes. Since PHP is such a small part I’d like to keep it as similar in code-style as possible.

Answer 1

PHP does not have the same form of objects that JavaScript does, as PHP is a class-based language, while JavaScript is a prototype-based language. What this essentially means is that PHP creates objects by instantiating a class. JavaScript, however, has objects that are then cloned to create new objects.

If you wish to keep your code understandable, I’d recommend using PHP classes:

class SomeClass {
    function alert($string) {
        // Do something
    }
    function action1() {
        $this->alert('Fire 1!');
    }
    function action2() {
        $this->alert('Fire 2!');
    }
    function action3() {
        $this->alert('Fire 3!');
    }
}

$something = new SomeClass();
$something->action2(); // Runs the action2 function of your object