Use is_a() instead of creating an object to check for its class

[ibennetch]

It's been suggested by @staabm that we could use "is_a() so we would not need to create a object just to check for its class".

This seems like a good idea to me.

[staabm]

I can work on that

[peter279k]

Just notice that this has the two approaches can check for the created class instance.

$stdClass = new stdClass();

is_a($stdClass, stdClass::class); // true
$stdClass instanceof stdClass; // true

[peter279k]

Here is the is_a and instanceof comparison.

• is_a is a function, and it will be significantly slower (since it has all the overhead of executing a function call).
• instanceof is a language construct. but the overall execution time is minimal in either method.

References

• https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/what-is-the-difference-between-is_a-function-and-instanceof-in-php/

[williamdes]

Fixed by #290