Interface with not-required methods

Question

Is there a way to indicate optional method in the interface (so that the contract only indicated the number / type of arguments to be given)?

Please give maybe a little more understanding and insight into the problem, and indicate a solution? See for instance this discussion: Optional Methods in Java Interface

In the app I'm using Listeners connected to the Persistence (Doctrine). So I'm using some of these methods:

prePersist()
preUpdate()
postPersist()
postUpdate()

etc.

Now, while refactoring, since there are too many Entities (objects to be persisted) I decided to split the parts of these methods into separate classes.

However not all of them need all pre-... and post-... methods. I need to make sure they are given appropriate number and type of arguments. How do you do that in PHP?

@Marcin: it's perfectly alright not to know what an interface is. If this question can be critiqued (and it can), it is that some prior research/reading might have been evidenced, so we know what in particular needs explaining. — halfer, Jan 11 '15 at 19:14
Meh, just posted an answer to a similar question before seeing this one. I thinks a good roundup of the answers posted here, so maybe it helps. https://stackoverflow.com/a/66883322/1248282 — mvmoay, Mar 31 '21 at 07:22

score 12 · Accepted Answer · answered Jan 11 '15 at 19:01

12

No. The whole idea of interfaces is to have a contract that guarantees that a method exists.

But a class can implement multiple interfaces, so you can define a different interface that contains that method and not add that interface to the class that doesn't have the method.

answered Jan 11 '15 at 19:01

GolezTrol

114,394
18
182
210

See my update. I'm not going to create a number of interfaces with pre- and post- methods. It's quite ridiculous, don't you think? ;) – forsberg Jan 11 '15 at 19:26
1

No I don't think so, but another solution would be to just add an empty implementation of the function. You could consider adding empty implementations in an Entity base class and only override these when needed. Anyway, you must have the implementation if the interface declares the function. It must be said though, that PHP isn't that strict anyway, and the (lack of) enforcement of interface rules is ridiculous. – GolezTrol Jan 11 '15 at 19:39
Ok, thanks for suggestion. I decided to go in large part the mentioned Java-discussion way, with a single interface. – forsberg Jan 12 '15 at 10:02

score 2 · Answer 2 · edited Oct 01 '15 at 21:49

Interfaces cannot have optional methods. That's the concept behind interface. If you however need something optional, then I suggest to additionally create default implementation of your interface which then all classes you need would then extend. This way all of these classes would implement interface and you would also be able to override just selected methods, having your optional behaviour.

Something like that:

interface MyInterface {
  public function method1();
  public function method2();
}

then Base class implements your interface's methods (I made it abstract to disallow direct use):

abstract class Base implements MyInterface {
    public function method1() {
       // dummy
    }
    public function method2() {
       // dummy
    }
}

and then:

class Optional extends Base {
   // method1 is not overridden, so Base' implementation applies

   public function method2() {
     // something here
   }
}

score 2 · Answer 3 · answered Sep 14 '17 at 00:40

Please see example here:

interface Workable
{
    public function work();
}

interface Feedable
{
    public function eat();
}

interface Employee extends Feedable, Workable
{
}

class Human implements Employee
{
    public function work()
    {
        // ....working
    }

    public function eat()
    {
        //.... eating in lunch break
    }
}

// robot can only work
class Robot implements Workable
{
    public function work()
    {
        // ....working
    }
}

Source: https://github.com/jupeter/clean-code-php

score 1 · Answer 4 · answered Jun 28 '16 at 18:26

1

I found an intresting library introducing WeakInterfaces. However I don't think it would be easy to make it work with Doctrine.

answered Jun 28 '16 at 18:26

Arkemlar

380
4
12

score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Jan 12 '15 at 10:20

After reading your comments, and internet as well, I decided to choose another work-around for the app design.

I created a single interface with all (required and to-be-optional) methods. Multiplying number of interfaces to acheive a simple task (especially in the case mentioned) I consider a really bad approach. This is because I believe the idea of class and interface is to keep connected things together, not to split them "artificially" into separate "containers". (Think for instance about a POPO in PHP / POJO in Java).

Now, all classes need to implement all potential methods, but some of them may be empty, or throw an exception, as indicated in the discussion with link given above, or by GolezTrol in his comment. Thanks for interest, anyway.

Interfaces should not be split into "artificial" containers, they should be split "logically". Interfaces are used to create proper logical abstractions in apps. It's up to the implementing class if it chooses to implement one or more interfaces. — Niklas Ekman, Mar 08 '18 at 11:22

Interface with not-required methods

5 Answers5

Linked