--- title: [RFC] grapheme_mask – Vote Initiation on July 3rd description: A PHP RFC proposes adding a new `grapheme_mask()` function to the `intl` extension for PHP 8.6. The function would allow developers to mask portions of strings... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-grapheme-mask-vote-initiation-on-july-3rd-zdnmcz1hi twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: [RFC] grapheme_mask – Vote Initiation on July 3rd | daily.dev og:description: A PHP RFC proposes adding a new `grapheme_mask()` function to the `intl` extension for PHP 8.6. The function would allow developers to mask portions of strings... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-grapheme-mask-vote-initiation-on-july-3rd-zdnmcz1hi og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/ZdnmCZ1hi.png og:image:alt: [RFC] grapheme_mask – Vote Initiation on July 3rd og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # [RFC] grapheme_mask – Vote Initiation on July 3rd **[externals.io](https://daily.dev/sources/externals)** · 4 min read · 1 upvotes · 1 comments ## Summary A PHP RFC proposes adding a new `grapheme_mask()` function to the `intl` extension for PHP 8.6. The function would allow developers to mask portions of strings while respecting grapheme cluster boundaries, preventing corruption of complex Unicode sequences like emojis, flags, and combined characters — useful for masking PII in multi-language environments. Voting was announced for July 3–11, 2026, but community members flagged that the RFC is not yet ready: it's still in Draft status, missing a link to the discussion thread, and the voting period must be at least 14 days per RFC policy. Additional feedback includes a request to link the implementation, a suggestion to include `str_mask()` for completeness, and a note about excessive LLM-generated language in communications. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Community discussion Top comments from developers on daily.dev. **@khevlar** · 0 upvotes > Unicode edge cases only become obvious after production issues. It's better to handle them correctly from the start. ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [\[RFC\] grapheme\_mask – Vote Initiation on July 3rd](https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-grapheme-mask-vote-initiation-on-july-3rd-dn5jskt2m) · externals.io · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [\[RFC\] grapheme\_mask – Vote Initiation on July 3rd](https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-grapheme-mask-vote-initiation-on-july-3rd-diyynffne) · externals.io · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [\[RFC\] grapheme\_mask – Vote Initiation on July 3rd](https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-grapheme-mask-vote-initiation-on-july-3rd-nnohr2yiz) · externals.io · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#webdev](https://daily.dev/tags/webdev), [#php](https://daily.dev/tags/php) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-grapheme-mask-vote-initiation-on-july-3rd-zdnmcz1hi) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"[RFC] grapheme_mask – Vote Initiation on July 3rd","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-grapheme-mask-vote-initiation-on-july-3rd-zdnmcz1hi","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-grapheme-mask-vote-initiation-on-july-3rd-zdnmcz1hi"},"datePublished":"2026-07-01T03:56:36.781Z","dateModified":"2026-07-01T03:56:59.442Z","description":"A PHP RFC proposes adding a new `grapheme_mask()` function to the `intl` extension for PHP 8.6. 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