PHP if/else shorthand multiple executions

Question

In Javascript we can do this by following code:

function test(a) { 
  a && (console.log("somthing"), executeOtherFunction()); 
}

this code above is shorthand of:

function test(a){
  if(a){
    console.log("something");
    executeOtherFunction()
  }
}

Is possible to get this working for PHP?

I don't mean that use console.log in PHP, just want use same thing in PHP.

Answer 1

It looks this works in PHP.

function test(a) { 
  a && (console_log("somthing") xor executeOtherFunction()); 
}

I think PHP is able to convert everything to bool without errors.

Answer 2

In PHP, there is also short-circuit in condition evaluation. With an AND (or &&), the evaluation will stop as soon as a false value is encountered.

But, the comma , operator is not supported by PHP. So, you can't execute two expressions by separating them with a ,. It is only allowed, as a syntactic sugar, in a for loop:

for ($a = 2, $b = 4; $a < 3; $a++)
           ^

This construction is also often used with or keyword:

someAction() or log("someAction() execution failed");

This will log the error only if someAction() returns false.

Answer 3

As Guillaume Poussel said, PHP knows short circuit in condition evaluation, but not chaining of code blocks via ,.

If you are willing to really abuse PHP's weak typing system, you could use something like this:

if ($a && function1() . function2() ) ;
                      ^ concatenate the results of the functions as strings

obviously this would only work if you don't need the return values of the functions.

disclaimer: I don't recommend the use of this in production code, but it is an interesting thought experiment