Thank you for this bug report. To properly diagnose the problem, we
need a short but complete example script to be able to reproduce
this bug ourselves. 

A proper reproducing script starts with <?php and ends with ?>,
is max. 10-20 lines long and does not require any external 
resources such as databases, etc. If the script requires a 
database to demonstrate the issue, please make sure it creates 
all necessary tables, stored procedures etc.

Please avoid embedding huge scripts into the report.

Here's a derived example. Looks like __set doesn't like arrays...

<?php
class baseClass {
	var $vars = [];
	function __get($var) {
		echo "got $var<br>";
		var_dump($this->vars[$var]);
	}
	function __set($var, $value) {
		echo "set $var = $value<br>";
		$this->vars[$var] = $value;
		echo "<pre>";
		var_dump($this->vars[$var]);
		echo "</pre><br>";
	}
}

$base = new baseClass();
$base->base_class = [];
$base->base_class['test'] = "hi"; // this doesn't work!
?>

But $var should be set to "something", it doesn't look like it is set to anything useful.

After some further investigation, it looks like the "var name" parameter is not set or unset when called like this. I updated the title to reflect this.

http://3v4l.org/5SH8M (3v4l may be having issues though)

Running that code you'll get an array-to-string notice (putting $value in a string), a "set" message, a "got" message, and another notice.

The "set" and "got" messages are obviously supposed to be there, but there will not be a second "set" because you are not trying to set a property of the object. To do so you must actually have a "$base->base_class = ...". Modifying a return value will not trigger it.

The second notice speaks to that point:
>Notice: Indirect modification of overloaded property baseClass::$base_class has
>no effect in %s on line %d
What __get returned was (null because you didn't put a return in there, but if you had returned $this->vars[$value] then it would be) a copy of the "test" array. PHP noticed that you tried to modify this copy and specifically warned you that it would not work.

Make __get() return by-reference so that you modify the "original" array and not a copy. Note this only works for values that can be referenced, like $this->vars[$var], and not for expressions or literal values. Which will not trigger a second __set() either.

*if you had returned $this->vars[$var]

:doh: Thanks for that...