The statement in the example 'works' in 5.3.3.

Here's what I'm using in my unit test for the presence of this bug:


$a = DateTime::createFromFormat('H:i:s', 'asdf');  // should throw Exception


The statement actually returns false and does not throw an exception.

So you actually prefer to write

    try {
        $a = DateTime::createFromFormat("H:i", "1:1");
    } catch (DateTimeException $ex) {
        // handle failure
    }

instead of

    if (($a = DateTime::createFromFormat("H:i", "1:1")) === false) {
        // handle failure
    }

I don't.  Feel free to pursue the RFC process[1], though. :)

[1] <https://wiki.php.net/rfc/howto>