Question

Many many times on a page I will have to set post and get values in PHP like this

I just want to know if it is better to just continue doing it the way I have above or if performance would not be touched by adding it into a function like in the code below?

This would make it much easiar to write code but at the expense of making extra function calls on the page.

I have all the time in the world so making the code as fast as possible is more important to me then making it “easiar to write or faster to develop”

Appreciate any advice and please nothing about whichever makes it easier to develop, I am talking pure performance here =)

<?php
function arg_p($name, $default = null) {
    return (isset($_GET[$name]))?$_GET[$name]:$default;
}

$pagesize = arg_p('pagesize', 10);

$pagesize = (isset($_GET['pagesize'])) ? $_GET['pagesize'] : 10;

?>

Answer 1

If you have all the time in the world, why don’t you just test it?

<?php
// How many iterations?
$iterations = 100000;

// Inline
$timer_start = microtime(TRUE);
for($i = 0; $i < $iterations; $i++) {
  $pagesize = (isset($_GET['pagesize'])) ? $_GET['pagesize'] : 10;
}
$time_spent = microtime(TRUE) - $timer_start;
printf("Inline: %.3fs\n", $time_spent);

// By function call
function arg_p($name, $default = null) {
  return (isset($_GET[$name])) ? $_GET[$name] : $default;
}

$timer_start = microtime(TRUE);
for($i = 0; $i < $iterations; $i++) {
  $pagesize = arg_p('pagesize', 10);
}
$time_spent = microtime(TRUE) - $timer_start;
printf("By function call: %.3fs\n", $time_spent);
?>

On my machine, this gives pretty clear results in favor of inline execution by a factor of almost 10. But you need a lot of iterations to really notice it.

(I would still use a function though, even if me answering this shows that I have time to waste 😉