Advanced & Compatibility¶

Most applications should start with the Recommended API documented in the task-oriented reference.

This area exists for two different audiences:

• Advanced API — supported 1.0 capabilities with narrower preconditions, deeper ODF/Writer semantics, tooling roles, or orchestration responsibilities.
• Compatibility API — retained behavior for existing applications and historical integrations. New code should normally use the stated replacement.

Public PHP visibility alone does not make a class or method application API. Infrastructure that is public for collaboration, testing, serialization, or internal extension mechanics remains outside the normal end-programmer reference.

Choose the right section¶

• Advanced API — supported specialist capabilities and extension seams.
• Compatibility & Deprecated API — retained historical calls, behavioral differences, and preferred replacements.

Deprecated APIs are not removed for 1.0 merely because a preferred replacement exists. Removal belongs to a later explicit compatibility decision.

Likewise, retired APIs that no longer exist in the current source are not resurrected as “compatibility APIs” by this documentation.

Classification rule¶

Recommended
    normal path for new application code

Advanced
    supported, but requires specialist lifecycle/ODF/tooling knowledge

Compatibility
    retained for existing callers; prefer the documented replacement

Deprecated
    compatibility surface explicitly discouraged for new code

Infrastructure / Hidden
    public in PHP for technical reasons, but not an end-programmer API

These classifications describe the 1.0 contract; they are not a promise that every public PHP symbol will remain public forever.