PHP undefined constant testing

Question

In PHP if I define a constant like this:

define('FOO', true);
if(FOO) do_something();

The method do_something gets executed as expected.

But if I don't define the BOO constant below:

if(BOO) do_something();

Then do_something also gets executed. What's going on here?

Answer 1

// BOO has not been defined

if(BOO) do_something();

BOO will be coerced into the string BOO, which is not empty, so it is truthy.

This is why some people who don't know better access an array member with $something[a].

You should code with error_reporting(E_ALL) which will then give you...

Notice: Use of undefined constant HELLO - assumed 'HELLO' in /t.php on line 5

You can see if it is defined with defined(). A lot of people use the following line so a PHP file accessed outside of its environment won't run...

<?php defined('APP') OR die('No direct access');

This exploits short circuit evaluation - if the left hand side is true, then it doesn't need to run the right hand side.

Answer 2

If you enable error logging, you'll see an error like the following:

PHP Notice: Use of undefined constant BOO - assumed 'BOO' in file at line N

What's happening is that PHP is just arbitrarily assuming that you meant to use 'BOO' and just forgot the quotes. And since strings other than '' and '0' are considered "true", the condition passes.