Support Autoloading Functions and Constants

[PabloJoan]

I have this composer package https://github.com/PabloJoan/slack-delete

I do not use any classes to write code. Only functions. I organize my code by putting 1 function in 1 file, organizing these files in folders, and then name space them. Basically following everything in PSR-4 except instead of a Class with namespace, its a Function with namespace.

there is no autoloading feature in composer to support this.

I've had to resort to using "files" to get this to work https://getcomposer.org/doc/04-schema.md#files .
The issue is that I have to manually add all these files and it can get very lengthy.

See below.
My composer.json:

{
    "autoload": {
        "files": [
            "src/APIURL.php",
            "src/Cli/getToken.php",
            "src/Cli/getUser.php",
            "src/Delete/all.php",
            "src/Delete/channels.php",
            "src/Delete/files.php",
            "src/Delete/groups.php",
            "src/Delete/history.php",
            "src/Delete/ims.php",
            "src/User/get.php"
        ]
    }
}

How would you suggest I manage this better?

[robfrawley]

Out of pure curiosity, why would you do this? Moving to classes will help with your own sanity as the project expands.

[PabloJoan]

You might be right. This is an experiment. eventually I would like to see how to implement functional programming in to PHP and seamlessly be part of the php community with composer. I know the sample project I have is not really "functional" right now, but composer supporting autoloaded functions with namespaces will be a huge leap forward.

It follows the same general namespacing rules as the PSR4 for classes, so its not intrusive to existing codebases.

[Seldaek]

PHP itself offers no autoloading of functions/constants, so until it does we can't really support that at all. Wrapping in classes definitely is easier, even though it feels a bit silly/redundant that the language makes us do that.

[crux]

this lack of autoloading function files is imposing Object Oriented mupitz on all of us. A function is a function and NOT! a class. It really is a sympthon of bad education of all these people who think putting pure stateless functions in a class is in any way a good idea. It totally sucks, and degrades software quality imposing OO mumpitz in places where it doesnt belong.

[GromNaN]

Composer has "file autoloading" that is used for functions and constants.
https://getcomposer.org/doc/04-schema.md#files

Example with Symfony polyfills
https://github.com/symfony/polyfill/blob/main/src/Php82/composer.json

[crux]

no, it does not. It has the "files" feature to autoload PHP files. But neither declaration of the function:

use My\Namespace\Functions\foo;

nor its usage:

foo(1,2,3);

will trigger the autoloading of the file containing the function.

Explicitly pre-loading all files is quite different from autoloading files on demand.

[Seldaek]

Please direct your php language feature requests/rants to the appropriate channels. There's nothing we can do about this here.

[crux]

Sorry when I was hurting your or anyone's feelings, but rejecting false statements is okay in a technical discussion?

Composer has "file autoloading" << , is best of case misleading, and in imho just plain wrong.

[charlesmulder]

I would also like to see this feature.