Global space
Name resolution rules
Namespaces
PHP Manual

## Using namespaces: fallback to global function/constant

Inside a namespace, when PHP encounters an unqualified Name in a class name, function or constant context, it resolves these with different priorities. Class names always resolve to the current namespace name. Thus to access internal or non-namespaced user classes, one must refer to them with their fully qualified Name as in:

Example #1 Accessing global classes inside a namespace

`<?php
namespace A\B\C;
class Exception extends \Exception {}
$a = new Exception('hi'); // $a is an object of class A\B\C\Exception
$b = new \Exception('hi'); // $b is an object of class Exception
$c = new ArrayObject; // fatal error, class A\B\C\ArrayObject not found
?>`

For functions and constants, PHP will fall back to global functions or constants if a namespaced function or constant does not exist.

Example #2 global functions/constants fallback inside a namespace

`<?php
namespace A\B\C;
const E_ERROR = 45;
function strlen($str)
{
return \strlen($str) - 1;
}
echo E_ERROR, "\n"; // prints "45"
echo INI_ALL, "\n"; // prints "7" - falls back to global INI_ALL
echo strlen('hi'), "\n"; // prints "1"
if (is_array('hi')) { // prints "is not array"
echo "is array\n";
} else {
echo "is not array\n";
}
?>`