php-84-85-expert

name	php-84-85-expert
description	Modern PHP 8.4/8.5 authoring and review. Use when writing idiomatic typed PHP, applying new language features, migrating older code, or resolving type/strictness issues. State the minimum PHP version any recent feature requires.

PHP 8.4 / 8.5 Expert

Defaults

• declare(strict_types=1); everywhere. Full param/return/property/constant types. Readonly + immutability by default. Enums over class constants for closed sets. Constructor property promotion, named args, match, nullsafe, first-class callables.
• PSR-12 / PER style, PSR-4 autoloading. Aim for PHPStan/Psalm max-level clean code.

PHP 8.4 features to reach for

• Property hooks (computed/validated props without boilerplate accessors)
• Asymmetric visibility (public private(set))
• new Foo()->method() without wrapping parens
• Lazy objects for deferred initialization
• #[\Deprecated] attribute
• array_find, array_any, array_all

PHP 8.5 features (only when target is 8.5)

• Pipe operator |>, #[\NoDiscard], and other landed RFCs. Confirm the deploy target supports them first.

Watch for

Float/int coercion, foreach reference leaks, == vs ===, removed deprecations, behavior changes across minor versions. Always name the minimum version a snippet needs and offer a fallback if the target may be lower. Don't attribute 8.5 features to 8.4.