Strict Standards: Non-static method DatabaseConnection::getConnection() should not be called statically in

Question

I'm using php, and the following line produces an error I've not been able to fix:

self::$connection = DatabaseConnection::getConnection();

Answer 1

The message is telling you that DatabaseConnection->getConnection(); is not a static method.

The difference is that static methods are called on a class and using the :: operator. Non-static methods (instance methods), are called on an instance of the class and using the -> operator.

PHP allowed non-static methods to be called in a static way, as long as they don't use any instance properties. With error reporting set to strict, it will throw this error though.

To solve it, either create a DatabaseConnection instance to call the method on, or change its declaration to static if it should be a static method.

You can also make error reporting less strict, but that's the wrong way to solve it in my book,