Magic Constants

Constants which hold information about the current location of the code.

Those constants are magic, because they have a constant syntax, yet their value may change, even during the execution of the code.

  • __LINE__ The current line number of the file.

  • __FILE__ The full path and filename of the file with symlinks resolved. If used inside an include, the name of the included file is returned.

  • __DIR__ The directory of the file. If used inside an include, the directory of the included file is returned. This is equivalent to dirname(__FILE__). This directory name does not have a trailing slash unless it is the root directory.

  • __FUNCTION__ The function name, or {closure} for anonymous functions.

  • __CLASS__ The class name. The class name includes the namespace it was declared in, e.g. Foo\Bar. When used in a trait method, __CLASS__ is the name of the class the trait is used in.

  • __TRAIT__ The trait name. The trait name includes the namespace it was declared in, e.g. Foo\Bar.

  • __METHOD__ The class method name.

  • __NAMESPACE__ The name of the current namespace.

  • __PROPERTY__ The name of the current property hook.

Those constants are case insensitive. While the common convention is to use them all in uppercase, all the following syntaxes work: __METHOD__, __method__, __meTHod__.

<?php

function foo() {
    // shows foo
    echo __FUNCTION__;
}

function goo() {
    // shows goo
    echo __FUNCTION__;
}

?>

Documentation

Related : Magic, Magic Property, Magic Methods, __CLASS__, __FUNCTION__, __METHOD__, Property Hook, __get() Method, __set() Method, Special Constant, __FILE__, __LINE__, __unset() Method, Constant Case, Automagic