Educator

Object Methods

• Classes can define functions, known as object methods, that instances of the class can execute.
• An object method is defined within the curly braces of a class definition using the same syntax used when creating user-defined functions.
• Object methods are called using the arrow operator ->. An object variable is followed by ->, the name of the method, and a set of parentheses, which can optionally include any arguments to be passed to the object method:

  $person1 = new Person();
  $person1->hello(); // object method requiring no arguments
  $person1->helloWithArg($arg1); // object method requiring arguments

• Object methods can return values just like user-defined functions.
• $this is a special variable in PHP that is used within a class’s methods to refer to the current instance of a class.
• A getter method retrieves the value of an object’s property.
• A setter method sets the value of an object’s property.
• An object method’s return value can be output within double-quoted strings using curly brace syntax:

  $person1 = new Person();
  $person1->setFirstName(‘Joe’);
  echo “First: {$person1->getFirstName()}”;

• Object methods can call other object methods of the same object instance by using the $this variable.