Why is it possible to override instance variables in PHP but not in Java?
instance-variables, java, oop, php
Solution
No, it has nothing to do with weak typing.
I guess this was simply a design decision that the PHP developers took. It may be because it is more of a scripting language than Java. (In Java, you would need to have a "virtual" lookup table for fields to support this or, alternatively, automatically generated getters / setters).
Problem
Consider the code below: ``` <?php class Base { protected $name = "Base"; public function getName() { return $this->name; } } class Foo extends Base { protected $name = "Foo"; } $f = new Foo(); echo $f->getName(); // output: Foo $b = new Base(); echo $b->getName(); // output: Base ``` Since in other languages such as Java won't allow you to override the instance variable, but it is possible in PHP. Is it because since PHP is weak type language so it is possible?