PHP 7 Upgrade Guide
Free!
With Membership
$7.99
Suggested price

PHP 7 Upgrade Guide

Your guide to new features, breaking changes, and more.

About the Book

The PHP 7 release is here, bringing some much-desired changes and improvements to the language.   This book covers all of the new features coming in PHP 7, as well as breaking changes and "gotchas" to watch out for.  You'll learn how to take advantage of these changes and get started with PHP 7 today.

Who is this book for?

This book is for PHP developers looking to jump into PHP 7.  You'll need previous experience with PHP in order to understand the topics and examples we'll cover.  The more you know about PHP 5 and OOP, the more you'll understand why some of the changes are important and how they'll impact your development.

If you're a manager or leader of a team looking to work in PHP 7, this book will help your developers quickly catch up on all the changes they need to know about, and even expose some new features they can take advantage of for faster, better development.

About the Author

Colin O'Dell
Colin O'Dell

Colin O'Dell is a Lead Web Developer at Unleashed Technologies, a web and hosting firm based in Maryland. He has been programming since 1996 and has over a decade of professional experience with PHP. In addition to being an active member of the PHP League and maintainer of the league/commonmark parser, Colin is also a conference speaker, author, Symfony Certified Developer (Expert), and Magento Certified Developer.

Reader Testimonials

Larry E. Masters
Larry E. Masters

Founder of CakePHP

Good quick read for those interested in PHP 7. Spend a few bucks and get it.

Jack Fruh
Jack Fruh

Co-Host, Laravel News Podcast

Just skimming through the PHP 7 Upgrade Guide and am REALLY impressed with the coverage of the new stuff in here - it goes way deeper than I thought, and is showing me things about PHP 7 that I didn't know about. There's been so much talk about PHP 7 being faster, and maybe even some "Just drop it in" mentality without discussion of the actual differences. I think this is going to be a really valuable resource for people - It should be required reading for all PHP devs!

Ian
Ian

/u/AfterNite

[The book] looks pretty well written. Examples are simple but to the point.

aquanutz
aquanutz

This book is great. Highly recommend it for those about to go through the upgrade to PHP 7.

Table of Contents

  • Preface
    • Who is this book for
    • Contents
    • Other resources
    • Acknowledgements
      • PHP Wiki and Documentation Content
  • Getting Started with PHP 7
    • Ubuntu 14.04 and 16.04+
    • Debian 8 & 9
    • Debian 6 & 7
    • CentOS / RHEL
    • Mac OS X
    • Windows
    • phpbrew
    • Docker
    • Vagrant Image
    • Build from Source
  • Part 1 - New Features
    • Chapter 1: Scalar Type Hints
      • Type Checking Modes
      • Mixing Modes
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 2: Return Type Declarations
      • Returning null
      • Sub-Class Methods
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 3: Combined Comparison (Spaceship) Operator
      • Comparing Values
      • Sorting
      • Sorting by multiple values
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 4: Null Coalesce Operator
      • Differences From ?:
      • Chaining
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 5: Unicode Codepoint Escape Syntax
      • Why the {}s?
      • Limitations
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading:
    • Chapter 6: Anonymous Classes
      • Nesting Classes
      • Use Cases
      • Differences from Named Classes
      • Further Reading:
    • Chapter 7: Group Use Declarations
      • Compound Namespaces
      • Further Reading:
    • Chapter 8: Closure call Method
      • Further Reading:
    • Chapter 9: Generator Return Expressions
      • Further Reading:
    • Chapter 10: Generator Delegation
      • Yielding Values
      • Sending Values
      • Exceptions
      • Return Values
      • Further Reading:
    • Chapter 11: Reliable User-land CSPRNG
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Forwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 12: Integer Division
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 13: preg_replace_callback_array
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 14: IntlChar Class
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
  • Part 2 - Language Changes & Improvements
    • Chapter 15: Performance
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 16: Language Consistency
      • Uniform Variable Syntax
      • Abstract Syntax Tree
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 17: Semi-Reserved Words
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 18: Error Handling and Exceptions
      • Exceptions in the Engine
      • Reclassification of E_STRICT Notices
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 19: Expectations
      • assert() as a statement
      • Custom errors
      • Configuration
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 20: Array Constants in define()
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 21: Filtered unserialize()
      • Secure filtering
      • Examples
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 22: session_start Options
      • New options
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 23: Reflection Enhancements
      • ReflectionGenerator
      • ReflectionType
      • ReflectionParameter
      • ReflectionFunctionAbstract
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 24: Integer Semantics
      • Casting NaN and Infinity
      • Negative bitwise shifting
      • Bitwise shifting too far
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 25: Division By Zero Semantics
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 26: JSON Library
      • Fractional float values
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 27: Behavior Changes to foreach
      • Changes
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 28: Behavior Changes to list
      • String Handling
      • Empty List Assignment
      • Variable Assignment Order
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 29: Parameter Handling Changes
      • Duplicate Parameter Names
      • func_get_arg() and func_get_args()
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 30: Custom Session Handler Return Values
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 31: Errors on Invalid Octal Literals
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
  • Part 3 - Deprecations & Removals
    • Chapter 32: Deprecation of PHP 4 Constructors
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 33: Deprecation of Salt Option for password_hash()
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 34: Removal of Previously-Deprecated Features
      • Removed Extensions
      • Removed Language Features
      • Removed Functions
      • Removed INI Options
      • Miscellaneous Removed Functionality
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 35: Removal of Alternative PHP Tags
      • Migrating From Alternative Tags
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 36: Reclassification and Removal of E_STRICT Notices
      • Examples
      • Same (compatible) property in two used traits
      • Accessing static property non-statically
      • Only variables should be assigned by reference
      • Only variables should be passed by reference
      • Calling non-static methods statically
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 37: Removal of Multiple Defaults in Switches
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 38: Removal of Numeric Hexadecimal String Support
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 39: Removal of Dead SAPIs and Extensions
      • Dead SAPIs
      • Dead Extensions
      • Backwards Compatibility
      • Further Reading
    • Chapter 40: Removal of the date.timezone Warning
      • Further Reading
  • Appendix - Backward Compatibility Breaks
    • Language Changes
      • Variable handling
      • list() behavior
      • foreach behavior
      • Parameter handling
      • Integer handling
      • String handling
      • Error handling
      • Other language changes
    • Standard Library Changes
    • Other Changes
      • Curl
      • Date
      • DBA
      • GMP
      • Intl
      • libxml
      • Mcrypt
      • Session
      • Opcache
      • OpenSSL
      • PCRE:
      • PDO_pgsql:
      • Standard:
      • JSON:
      • Stream:
      • XSL:
  • Notes

Causes Supported

Open Sourcing Mental Illness, Ltd

Changing how we talk about mental health in the tech community.
https://osmihelp.org

Changing how we talk about mental health in the tech community.

Open Sourcing Mental Illness is a non-profit, 501c3 corporation dedicated to raising awareness, educating, and providing resources to support mental wellness in the tech and open source communities. OSMI began in 2013 as a speaking campaign by Ed Finkler. Ed started speaking at tech conferences about his personal experiences as a web developer and open source advocate with a mental health disorder. The response was overwhelming, and Ed has continued to speak, gather data, and organize efforts to change experiences of those with mental health disorders in the tech workplace. This includes speaking at conferences and companies, conducting research, and creating documentation to assist companies in making supportive environments for those impacted by mental health disorders. He is assisted in these efforts by selfless volunteers who bring their time and expertise to bear on this important issue.

The Leanpub 60 Day 100% Happiness Guarantee

Within 60 days of purchase you can get a 100% refund on any Leanpub purchase, in two clicks.

Now, this is technically risky for us, since you'll have the book or course files either way. But we're so confident in our products and services, and in our authors and readers, that we're happy to offer a full money back guarantee for everything we sell.

You can only find out how good something is by trying it, and because of our 100% money back guarantee there's literally no risk to do so!

So, there's no reason not to click the Add to Cart button, is there?

See full terms...

80% Royalties. Earn $16 on a $20 book.

We pay 80% royalties. That's not a typo: you earn $16 on a $20 sale. If we sell 5000 non-refunded copies of your book or course for $20, you'll earn $80,000.

(Yes, some authors have already earned much more than that on Leanpub.)

In fact, authors have earnedover $13 millionwriting, publishing and selling on Leanpub.

Learn more about writing on Leanpub

Free Updates. DRM Free.

If you buy a Leanpub book, you get free updates for as long as the author updates the book! Many authors use Leanpub to publish their books in-progress, while they are writing them. All readers get free updates, regardless of when they bought the book or how much they paid (including free).

Most Leanpub books are available in PDF (for computers) and EPUB (for phones, tablets and Kindle). The formats that a book includes are shown at the top right corner of this page.

Finally, Leanpub books don't have any DRM copy-protection nonsense, so you can easily read them on any supported device.

Learn more about Leanpub's ebook formats and where to read them

Write and Publish on Leanpub

You can use Leanpub to easily write, publish and sell in-progress and completed ebooks and online courses!

Leanpub is a powerful platform for serious authors, combining a simple, elegant writing and publishing workflow with a store focused on selling in-progress ebooks.

Leanpub is a magical typewriter for authors: just write in plain text, and to publish your ebook, just click a button. (Or, if you are producing your ebook your own way, you can even upload your own PDF and/or EPUB files and then publish with one click!) It really is that easy.

Learn more about writing on Leanpub