In what situations should PHP developers avoid relying on magic methods for property access in classes?

PHP developers should avoid relying on magic methods for property access in classes when the properties are meant to be accessed directly for better readability and maintainability of the code. Magic methods can make the code harder to understand and debug, especially for new developers joining the project. Instead, developers should explicitly define getter and setter methods for properties that need to be accessed or modified. 

class User {
    private $name;

    public function getName() {
        return $this->name;
    }

    public function setName($name) {
        $this->name = $name;
    }
}

$user = new User();
$user->setName('John Doe');
echo $user->getName(); // Output: John Doe

Keywords

magic methods property access classes PHP developers situations

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