How to map a property that is an array of objects?

[chuckadams]

I'm trying to replace a DTO base class design with Valinor, but I'm running into a problem doing something really basic, and that's deserialize an array of objects. I was under the impression that the example code below would do it, but apparently it's not parsing the PHPdoc annotations at all.

In the DTO system, I needed an attribute, and I tried writing an ArrayOf converter attribute as well, but I could never make it trigger at all, let alone convert anything. I can paste that attempt if needed, but I'm wondering if I'm missing anything obvious?

<?php

use CuyZ\Valinor\MapperBuilder;

class Catalog
{
    // neither @param nor var work here
    /** @param list<Product> $products */
    public function __construct(
        public readonly string $name,

        /** @var list<Product> */
        public readonly array $products,
    ) {}
}

class Product
{
    public function __construct(
        public readonly string $name,
        public readonly float $price,
    ) {}
}

$raw_catalog = [
    'name' => 'Stuff',
    'products' => [
        ['name' => 'Thing', 'price' => 100.00],
        ['name' => 'Other Thing', 'price' => 200.00],
    ]
];

$mapper = (new MapperBuilder)
    ->allowPermissiveTypes() // needs allowPermissiveTypes to work at all
    ->mapper();

$catalog = $mapper->map(Catalog::class, $raw_catalog); // $catalog->products is still a raw array
$products = $mapper->map('list<Product>', $raw_catalog['products']); // works fine

dd($catalog, $products);

[romm]

Hi @chuckadams this should work well. It looks like the PHPDoc is not read properly, maybe check for your PHP ini settings to see if there is an option that somehow "removes" them during runtime, or something like this?

[romm]

Also, using allowPermissiveTypes seems useless in the example you posted. 😊

[chuckadams]

💡 Aha: it appears to be a consequence of doing this in a REPL -- specifically Laravel Tinker via the phpstorm plugin, but I suspect any psysh-based shell would have the same problem. If I add the autoloader line and run this from a file, it works as expected. If there's any way to make it work in a repl, that'd be wonderful, otherwise perhaps it's something to point out in the documentation? I imagine eval is out of the picture too... (worked fine in an eval, actually, so it's something about the REPL)