strcmp equivelant for integers (intcmp) in PHP

Question

So we got this function in PHP

strcmp(string $1,string $2) // returns -1,0, or 1;

We Do not however, have an intcmp(); So i created one:

function intcmp($a,$b) {
    if((int)$a == (int)$b)return 0;
    if((int)$a  > (int)$b)return 1;
    if((int)$a  < (int)$b)return -1;
}

This just feels dirty. What do you all think?

this is part of a class to sort Javascripts by an ordering value passed in.

class JS
{
    // array('order'=>0,'path'=>'/js/somefile.js','attr'=>array());
    public $javascripts = array(); 
    ...
    public function __toString()
    {
        uasort($this->javascripts,array($this,'sortScripts'));
        return $this->render();
    }
    private function sortScripts($a,$b)
    {
        if((int)$a['order'] == (int)$b['order']) return 0;
        if((int)$a['order'] > (int)$b['order']) return 1;
        if((int)$a['order'] < (int)$b['order']) return -1;
    }
    ....
}

Answer 1

I wouldn't call it dirty per se, it seems valid enough. But I can't think where I would use that function. My only suggestion might be to include else:

function intcmp($a,$b)
{
    if((int)$a == (int)$b)return 0;
    else if((int)$a  > (int)$b)return 1;
    else if((int)$a  < (int)$b)return -1;
}

Answer 2

At a glance, yes it feels dirty. Except there must be a good reason you wrote that instead of just using the actual ==, >, and < operators. What was the motivation for creating this function?

If it were me, I'd probably just do something like:

$x = $a==$b ? 0 : ($a>$b ? 1 : ($a<$b ? -1 : null));

I realize this is just as ugly, and the : null; - not sure if PHP requires it or if I could have just done :; but I don't like it and that code should never execute anyway... I think I'd be a lot less confused about this if I knew the original requirements!

Answer 3

This code doesn't help you actually compare integers because it returns an integer - you still have to use a comparison operator to determine if the result is positive/negative/zero - so you might as well just compare the original values (which will also be considerably faster)

Answer 4

You could use

function intcmp($a,$b)
    {
    return ($a-$b) ? ($a-$b)/abs($a-$b) : 0;
    }

Although I don't see the point in using this function at all

Answer 5

Does it have to be +1 and -1? If not, just return (int) $a - (int) $b. I don't like the divide that someone else recommended, and there's no need to check for all three cases. If it's not greater and not equal, it must be less than.

return (int) $a > (int) $b ? 1 : (int) $a == (int) $b ? 0 : -1;

Answer 6

Sort your data with:

function sortScripts($a, $b)
{
    return $a['order'] - $b['order'];
}

Use $b-$a if you want the reversed order.