At first I thought this article might be about array programming languages[1], but then I remembered today's date. If I understand correctly, this "technique" relies on the fact that PHP "arrays" are associative structures that might be called a map in conventional terminology- wouldn't "Map-oriented programming" make more sense?

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Array_programming_language

You are correct. PHP arrays are actually just ordered maps, so "map-oriented programming" would be appropriate in PHP. However, there is no traditional array implementation in PHP, so calling it "map-oriented programming" within the context of PHP would be ambiguous.

That all said, this "technique" could be used with a traditional array, in theory. The array in the example is fixed-length, and the keys themselves aren't really used at all.

The best part was when the ninja's put candy in my pocket.

"PHP has curly braces so that servers do not get confused".

I can't tell if this is an april fool's joke or not.

It's no crazier than any other "paradigm-redefining" introspective code blog post we see the web churn out day after day.

As the author of this blog post, let me just say that that is a sad (but not untrue) statement, my friend.

Never mind.

slow start to the day?

Considering these april fools jokes aren't supposed to be on the front page, this is forgivable

Not that I have control over who upvotes this, but did I miss a memo or something?

Actually, it looks like I misunderstood. "All April Fools' Day Jokes on the Web are Here (so they don't clutter HN)" was the top link when I opened HN today so I thought it was some official stance. It appears to just be another submission. My bad.