What's the difference between $bar = boolval($foo) and $bar = (bool) $foo in php?

Question

Same for intval / (int), floatval / (float), etc.

As far as I can make out, neither changes the original variable, and they both return the casted version. They appear to be functionally identical.

Are there edge cases where there's a difference?

Any reason to ever use one over the other?

Best practice?

I'm assuming that (bool) is "better", as I figure it's probably quicker than a function call that internally probably just does the same thing. If that's the case though, what's the point of these boolval/intval/floatval functions?

Answer 1

For the most part they are identical, however there are subtle differences:

• some functions like intval accept a second parameter ($base), which the cast syntax does not
• a function call has a little more overhead
• functions can be used as callbacks (e.g. array_map('intval', ..)), which is not possible with the cast syntax