Question

Take the following function for example:

private function connect($method, $target = $this->_config->db()) {
    try {
        if (!($this->_pointer = @fopen($target, $method)))
            throw new Exception("Unable to connect to database");
    }  catch (Exception $e) {
            echo $e->getMessage();
    }
}

As you can see I inserted the function $this->_config->db() into the parameter $target as it’s default value. I understand this is not the correct syntax and am just trying to explain my aim.

$this->_config->db() is a getter function.

Now I know I can use an anonymous function and call it via $target later, but I want $target to also accept direct string values.

How could I give it a default value of the whatever is returned by $this->_config->db() and still be able to overwrite it with a string value?

Answer 1

Why not accept NULL values by default (test with is_null()) and if so call your default function?