Sebastian Bergmann points out a new feature that PHPUnit (the popular PHP unit testing tool) now has - parallel_test_execution allowing for each test to execute on a separate PHP process.

The advantages of this include full test isolation and the fact that a test can now cause a PHP fatal error or even a segmentation fault of the PHP interpreter without interrupting the test execution.

He does mention, however, that it can cause a bit more overhead for larger testing suites since it needs to create a new process (complete with memory usage) for each running test. There are also coding issues that could be thrown off by this option (he gives an example of an inheritance issue with eZ Components).

He also notes some of his thoughts on how to control/configure the process (like in a configuration file) and via an "@isolated" notation to make it easy to do it dynamically.

Despite some apparent time as a nurse for two small furry creatures, Scott Johnson as found time to get back into his "geekiness" in this new post on his blog.

He asks the question: "Is there significant overhead to the is_ functions like is_array, is_object, is_string in php?" He wonders if those kinds of functions, since they are on such a base level, could cause more trouble than their worth when used en masse. He asks because it's used heavily in an approach for his developing Ookles application.

There's already been one comment made on the post, and it mentions that they are, in fact, a trivial call to PHP. It's a simple test that validates simply without much need for too much background action. It does mentions some caveats - is_object, is_resource, and, at times, is_callable.