Php __get and __set magic methods - why do we need those here?

Question

On Zend Quick Start Guide here http://framework.zend.com/manual/en/learning.quickstart.create-model.html we can see:

class Application_Model_Guestbook
{
    protected $_comment;
    protected $_created;
    protected $_email;
    protected $_id;

    public function __set($name, $value);
    public function __get($name);


    public function setComment($text);
    public function getComment();
...

I normally create my getters and setters without any magic method. I've seen this on the quick guide, and I don't understand why may we need this.

Can anyone help me out?

Thanks a lot

Answer 1

You (usually) never call __set or __get directly. $foo->bar will call $foo->__get('bar') automatically if bar is not visible and __get exists.

In the tutorial you've linked to, the getter and setter get set up to automatically call the appropriate individual get/set functions. So $foo->comment = 'bar' will indirectly call $foo->setComment('bar'). This isn't necessary... it's only a convenience.

In other cases, __get can be useful to create what looks like a read-only variable.