I propose to add an alternative (backward compatible) short array creation syntax: $a = [ 1, 2, 3 ]; and $a = [ 'a' => 42, 'b' => "foo" ];

It can also be used in function calls: img(['src' => "logo.gif", 'alt' => "Logo"]);

Reason behind this change: Arrays are used a lot and should therefore have as little syntactic overhead as possible. And I think the short syntax is also easier to read and write.

A patch for the parser is trivial and is attached for Zend2.

Note: I checked the newsgroup archive but couldn't find a discussion about this. After not hearing back about my proposed enhancement to debug_backtrace() and the dangling comma for function call parameters being rejected I wonder if I'm using the right mailing list for this :-)

- Chris

Index: Zend/zend_language_parser.y =================================================================== RCS file: /repository/ZendEngine2/zend_language_parser.y,v retrieving revision 1.127 diff -u -r1.127 zend_language_parser.y --- Zend/zend_language_parser.y 19 Oct 2003 08:38:48 -0000 1.127 +++ Zend/zend_language_parser.y 4 Nov 2003 23:32:12 -0000 @@ -581,6 +581,7 @@ | '@' { zend_do_begin_silence(&$1 TSRMLS_CC); } expr { zend_do_end_silence(&$1 TSRMLS_CC); $$ = $3; } | scalar { $$ = $1; } | T_ARRAY '(' array_pair_list ')' { $$ = $3; } + | '[' array_pair_list ']' { $$ = $2; } | '`' encaps_list '`' { zend_do_shell_exec(&$$, &$2 TSRMLS_CC); } | T_PRINT expr { zend_do_print(&$$, &$2 TSRMLS_CC); } ;