Php Token Reflection Laravel Package

Getting Started

Begin by installing via Composer: composer require andrewsville/php-token-reflection. Despite being archived, it remains usable for static inspection of PHP source without execution. Initialize the broker and parse a file:

$broker = new TokenReflection\Broker();
$broker->addCode(file_get_contents('src/MyService.php'));
$class = $broker->getClass('App\MyService');

First use case: Extract public method names and their docblock short descriptions for generating API documentation stubs or scaffolding service introspection.

Implementation Patterns

• CI linter pipelines: Embed into pre-commit or CI checks (e.g., via Symfony Finder + TokenReflection\Broker) to enforce internal conventions—e.g., require @deprecated tags on methods with specific names.
• Boilerplate generation: Inspect model classes for properties and type hints to scaffold DTOs, factories, or Doctrine listeners automatically.
• Legacy migration scripts: Scan codebases for @method annotations referencing removed methods or deprecated patterns (e.g., mysql_* calls in docblocks).
• Watch-mode tooling: Combine with a file watcher (e.g., chokidar CLI or Laravel’s artisan make:listener --watch) by calling clearCache() after addCode() to refresh reflection state incrementally.
• IDE helper enrichment: Feed parsed class metadata into ide-php or intelephense plugins to补充 missing docblocks or improve autocomplete fidelity.

Gotchas and Tips

• PHP 8+ limitations: Typed properties, union types (int|string), and attributes (#[Route(...)]) are not reliably parsed—verify against your PHP version; many modern syntax features will throw or misinterpret tokens.
• Namespace resolution gap: The library gives you the declared namespace, but not resolved FQCNs from imports (use App\Models\User → App\Models\User). You must manually resolve using getNamespaceAliases() and getImports().
• Caching behavior: Broker caches parsed results in memory and may use opcache.file_cache. Always call $broker->clearCache() before re-parsing modified files in long-running processes (e.g., console commands).
• No constant resolution: Class constants (self::MAX_RETRY) are exposed as strings—no runtime value resolution. Use ReflectionClass::getConstant() only works for declared constants, not values.
• Fork responsibly: For production use, consider forking to patch critical gaps (e.g., PHP 8.1+ union types) or migrate to nikic/php-parser + custom AST visitors for better maintainability and PHP version support.