Php Namespaces, what are they?

Question

Hi guys. Im learning laravel and I dont understand some core php practices so perhaps you can help me understand namespacing. I know that at the top of my controllers i import like so: use App\User; but for the vendor folders that are referenced like that without an absolute path, that I dont understand. How does the php class im writing know where the classes Im including are based on a relative path?

Answer 1

Namespaces are a way of encapsulating items. 
Namespaces are designed to solve two problems that authors of libraries and applications encounter when creating re-usable code elements such as classes or functions:

1.Name collisions between code you create, and internal PHP classes/functions/constants or third-party classes/functions/constants.

2.Ability to alias (or shorten) Extra_Long_Names designed to alleviate the first problem, improving readability of source code.

PHP Namespaces provide a way in which to group related classes, interfaces, functions and constants.
You can find more info and examples about namespaces here:

https://www.php.net/manual/en/language.namespaces.rationale.php

https://www.php.net/manual/en/language.namespaces.php

Answer 2

Thank you Manos Manik

Answer 3

I have come back to my question just now. I know how namespaces work :)