I'd have to look much more closely to make sure nobody sneaks in a "~>" where it shouldn't be.

Sorry, but that is a bit of a crock.

~> versus ->, is certainly no harder to "detect" than . versus ',', (or $l .v. $1, O .v. 0 etc.) and the results can be equally mysterious and damaging.

If your font is unclear, use a proper programming font.

If your eyesight is poor -- as mine is -- use a bigger font.

Just want to note that I don't regard your opinions as wrong, they just differ from mine. I hope I'm doing a half-way decent job at explaining why I hold these views :)

Ditto! (And you have:)

Do you have anything against "?->" visually itself, or do you simply prefer "~>" for being more concise (or something else)?

My eyes/brain have become used over the past 30 years or so to translating -> into points at, without conscious effort.

In the smae way as you can raed tihs snetnce wihtupt dicffiluty dsetite the tpyos, I believe that I will be able to read $ref~>meth( $arg ) equally easily.

However, I think that every time I encountered $ref?->meth( $arg ), that ? is going to stand out like a sore thumb, ring an alarm bell, and throw a brake on my flow.

And given that the vast majority of the time, $ref~>meth( $arg ) will act exactly like $ref->meth( $arg ), that would be giving it a prominence that it simply does deserve or warrant. (IMO:)

Stated the other way, I think that when you need to notice it, ~> is sufficiently different; but when you don't need to notice, it is sufficiently similar to ->, as to not cry wolf in your subconsciousness.