PHP 5.4 - 'closure $this support'

Question

I see that the new planned features for PHP 5.4 are: traits, array dereferencing, a JsonSerializable interface and something referred to as \'closure $this support

Answer 1

This was already planned for PHP 5.3, but

For PHP 5.3 $this support for Closures was removed because no consensus could be reached how to implement it in a sane fashion. This RFC describes the possible roads that can be taken to implement it in the next PHP version.

It indeed means you can refer to the object instance (live demo)

value; };
  }
}

$a = new A;
$fn = $a->getClosure();
echo $fn(); // 1

For a discussion, see the PHP Wiki

• Closures: Object extension

and for historic interest:

• closures (rfc)
• removal-of-this (rfc:closures)