Back in 2009 and 2010 I wrote about a PHPUnit patch I wrote to automatically verify parameter types in function calls. The feature never made it into PHPUnit and honestly it didn’t really fit into the feature set either. Although I still plan on releasing it as a PHPUnit extension that you can easily load, I’ve since been using it outside of PHPUnit, not just on tests, but on any PHP code.

Introducing PHPConsistent

PHPConsistent will verify your code using both dynamic and static analysis.

The goal is to improve code quality of your code and the libraries you use by :

• Verifying your code is making calls using the right parameters and parameter types
• Verifying if the in-line documentation (docblock) of the called functions/methods is accurate

It will compare :

• Parameter types specified in the docblock <-> types of parameters passed upon calling the function/method
• Number of parameters specified in the docblock <-> number of parameters actually present in the function/method definition
• Names of parameters specified in the docblock <-> names of parameters actually present in the function/method definition

Sample output

Invalid type calling SomeClass->GiveMeAnArray : parameter 3 ($somearray) should be of type array but got boolean instead : library/App.php (line 5)
Parameter names in function definition and docblock don't match when calling JustAnotherFunction : parameter 2 ($inputFilename) should be called $inputFile according to docblock : application/Bootstrap.php (line 214)
Parameter count in function definition and docblock don't match when calling OneMoreFunction : function has 6 but should be 5 according to docblock : application/Bootstrap.php (line 215)

Performance

Keep in mind that PHPConsistent relies on Xdebug’s trace functionality, making it quite slow. It also needs to analyze the output of that trace, making it even slower. So it’s definitely not something you want to run on a production environment !

Want to know more ?

Check out the PHPConsistent Github page