(PHP 4 >= 4.2.0, PHP 5, PHP 7)
is_a — Checks if the object is of this class or has this class as one of its parents
$object
, string $class_name
[, bool $allow_string = FALSE
] )
Checks if the given object is of this class or has
this class as one of its parents.
objectThe tested object
class_nameThe class name
allow_string
If this parameter set to FALSE, string class name as object
is not allowed. This also prevents from calling autoloader if the class doesn't exist.
Returns TRUE if the object is of this class or has this class as one of
its parents, FALSE otherwise.
| Version | Description |
|---|---|
| 5.3.9 |
Added allow_string parameter
|
| 5.3.0 |
This function is no longer deprecated, and will therefore
no longer throw E_STRICT warnings.
|
| 5.0.0 |
This function became deprecated in favour of the
instanceof
operator. Calling this function will result in an
E_STRICT warning.
|
Example #1 is_a() example
<?php
// define a class
class WidgetFactory
{
var $oink = 'moo';
}
// create a new object
$WF = new WidgetFactory();
if (is_a($WF, 'WidgetFactory')) {
echo "yes, \$WF is still a WidgetFactory\n";
}
?>
Example #2 Using the instanceof operator in PHP 5
<?php
if ($WF instanceof WidgetFactory) {
echo 'Yes, $WF is a WidgetFactory';
}
?>
At least in PHP 5.1.6 this works as well with Interfaces.
<?php
interface test {
public function A();
}
class TestImplementor implements test {
public function A () {
print "A";
}
}
$testImpl = new TestImplementor();
var_dump(is_a($testImpl,'test'));
?>
will return true
Be careful! Starting in PHP 5.3.7 the behavior of is_a() has changed slightly: when calling is_a() with a first argument that is not an object, __autoload() is triggered!
In practice, this means that calling is_a('23', 'User'); will trigger __autoload() on "23". Previously, the above statement simply returned 'false'.
More info can be found here:
https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=55475
Whether this change is considered a bug and whether it will be reverted or kept in future versions is yet to be determined, but nevertheless it is how it is, for now...
is_a returns TRUE for instances of children of the class.
For example:
class Animal
{}
class Dog extends Animal
{}
$test = new Dog();
In this example is_a($test, "Animal") would evaluate to TRUE as well as is_a($test, "Dog").
This seemed intuitive to me, but did not seem to be documented.
I just want to point out that you can replace "is_a()" function with the "instanceof" operator, BUT you must use a variable to pass the class name string.
This will work:
<?php
$object = new \stdClass();
$class_name = '\stdClass';
var_dump(is_a($object, $class_name)); // bool(true)
var_dump(is_a($object, '\stdClass')); // bool(true)
var_dump($object instanceof $class_name); // bool(true)
?>
While this don't:
<?php
$object = new \stdClass();
var_dump($object instanceof '\stdClass'); // Parse error: syntax error, unexpected ''\stdClass'' (T_CONSTANT_ENCAPSED_STRING)
?>
As of PHP 5.3.9, is_a() seems to return false when passed a string for the first argument. Instead, use is_subclass_of() and, if necessary for your purposes, also check if the two arguments are equal, since is_subclass_of('foo', 'foo') will return false, while is_a('foo', 'foo') used to return true.
