PHP function/method returning boolean result and a status message

Question

I have a class with methods that need to return their result status (true|false) and also return a status message ("It worked/did not work because of x...").

Here are the two approaches I've tried...

Approach # 1: Return boolean and pass message by reference

Example of function:

function do_something ($arg1, $arg2, &$message) {

  ... do stuff resulting success...

  // Give an explanation for why it succeeded... reasons could be varied:
  $message = 'It succeeded and here are your instructions for celebrating: ...';
  $success = true;

  ... do stuff resulting in failure...

  // Give an explanation for why it failed... reasons could be varied:
  $message = 'it failed because of so and so...';
  $success = false;

  return $success;
}

Example of call:

$message = '';
if ( do_something($arg1, $arg2, $message) ) {
  echo "It succeeded because $message.";
} else {
  echo "It failed because $message."
}

Approach # 2: Return a Result object

Example of function:

function do_something ($arg1, $arg2) {

  ... do stuff...

  // Give an explanation for why it succeeded... reasons could be varied:
  $message = 'It succeeded and here are your instructions for celebrating: ...';
  $success = true;

  ... do stuff...

  // Give an explanation for why it failed... reasons could be varied:
  $message = 'it failed because of so and so...';
  $success = false;

  return new Result($success, $message);
}

You can imagine what the class definition of Result would like like, so I'll spare the example.

Example of call:

$message = '';
$DoSomething = do_something($arg1, $arg2, $message);
if ( $DoSomething->success ) {
  echo "It succeeded because ". $DoSomething->message;
} else {
  echo "It failed because ". $DoSomething->message;
}

What is the best approach and why?

Answer 1

I would go with returning an associative array with two elements:

return array('result' => true, 'message' => 'The operation executed fine!')

or

return array('result' => false, 'message' => 'The operation failed because...')

This way client code would access the values this way:

$retval = do_something();
if($retval['result']){
    //...
}
else{
echo 'Ooups: ', $retval['message'];
}

Or, if you need these result values throughout many modules of your code I would go with approach #2 "Return a Result object", because by using this approach the data is more encapsulated.

Personal opinion: I definitely wouldn't use references in PHP, I just don't feel them in this language.