Deprecate internal SplFileInfo::_bad_state_ex() method

[Girgias]

Use standard VM handling instead

Not exactly sure how to write a test for this.

[cmb69]

Hmm, removing a public function (even when prefixed with _ and undocumented) in a minor version doesn't look like a good idea (although that method might better not have been introduced in the first place).

[Girgias]

I would be very surprised if someone actually uses this, it also makes for a very confusing back trace.

But I suppose it's always possible to just deprecate the method and remove it in PHP 9.

[jurchiks]

Hmm, removing a public function (even when prefixed with _ and undocumented) in a minor version doesn't look like a good idea (although that method might better not have been introduced in the first place).

Why was this function even public in the first place? It's obviously internal use only, not to mention completely redundant as it's only really used in one place. Stuff like this shouldn't be allowed in code in the first place, and if it's already there, it should be gotten rid of ASAP, it's just bad code smell.

[javiereguiluz]

Here are all the occurrences of this method in the entire GitHub codebase, in case you want to check if any of those usages is legit:

https://github.com/search?l=PHP&p=1&q=_bad_state_ex&type=Code

[jurchiks]

Ouch. Now if only there was a way to filter by filename ext/spl/spl_directory.stub.php, which are all clones of php-src, along with some other common stub file names...
Then we'd see the real picture.

[nikic]

We'll probably want to move this check into each method and drop the get_method overload. That way the stack trace should be correct. Can you adjust the test to also check stack trace?

[Girgias]

So I tried to do this, but because userland can extend the class and rewrite the method, this check will not be done if moved into each function, that's why I think it's a get handler and I don't know how to fix it.

[cmb69]

Isn't the method final?

[Girgias]

This method is final, but I was talking about how other methods can be overwritten and thus bypass a check we could introduce in the method to see if the object is properly initialised. And I think the get_method overload checks that a userland class can't put the object in an invalid state (which mainly seems to be an issue for the GlobIterator)

[ramsey]

I get 32 results when I query for _bad_state_ex filename:"spl_directory.stub.php" language:PHP

https://github.com/search/advanced?q=_bad_state_ex+filename%3A%22spl_directory.stub.php%22&type=Code

So, that stands to reason that the results of _bad_state_ex language:PHP minus 32 would be closer to the actual number:

https://github.com/search?q=_bad_state_ex+language%3APHP&type=Code

So, it's somewhere around 5,000.

Many of those still appear to be stubs of some form or another.