Feature examples

Reflecting on classes not yet loaded

In most cases, creating reflections using a built-in SourceLocator or the ReflectionClass::createFromName() technique doesn't attempt to load code. This means if a class has not already been declared, you can safely assume that Better Reflection won't load the class.

Note that if the class is already loaded, then this Better Reflection does not then unload that class - this is not currently possible in PHP.

Reflecting on things within a string

See Loading a class from a string

Analysing types from DocBlocks

Not used and not planned to be used in the future.

PHP 7 Parameter Type Declarations and Return Type Declarations

These act in the same way as the core reflection API, except they return a \Roave\BetterReflection\Reflection\ReflectionType instance (which does not extend \ReflectionType).

$reflectionType = $parameterInfo->getType();