On John Cox's weblog today, he has a new post with a deeper look at something mentioned on Dynamically Typed - PHP 4.4's Return by Reference notice.

Dynamically Typed, the SitePoint PHP Blog has a very good explanation and discussion for the PHP 4.4 return by reference notice which has hit a few applications. It provides a point / counter point view which sheds light on both sides of the squabble of whether these changes break backwards compatibility with previous PHP versions. I have planted myself firmly in the middle of the road on this argument, as I am waiting for someone to determine if this is a PHP bug or a Application bug. Doesn't matter to me, as it is more fun to take pot shots after the fact.

He notes that there is a bug mentioned (and listed), but it's not comepletely clear as to if they're caused by the same thing. There is a temporary fix that he notes as well, but there still that nagging feeling about not knowing if it's truely a PHP bug or an application bug...