When do/should I use __construct(), __get(), __set(), and __call() in PHP?

Question

A similar question discusses __construct, but I left it in my title for people searching who find this one.

Apparently, __get and __set take a parameter that is the

Answer 1

PHP allows us to create class variables dynamically which can cause problems. You can use __set and __get methods to restrict this behavior..see the example below...

class Person { 
      public $name;
      public function printProperties(){
       print_r(get_object_vars($this));
      }
}

$person = new Person();
$person->name = 'Jay'; //This is valid
$person->printProperties();
$person->age = '26';  //This shouldn't work...but it does 
$person->printProperties();

to prevent above you can do this..

public function __set($name, $value){
    $classVar = get_object_vars($this);
    if(in_array($name, $classVar)){
    $this->$name = $value;
    }
}

Hope this helps...