[wry_discontent]

This sounds great until one of your other functions calls that function.

You're just describing dependency injection, but if you say that, people won't want to listen cause doing that all the time sucks.

[bccdee]

Dependency injection frameworks can be a pain, but basic dependency injection (e.g. pass a DB handle to anything that needs the DB) is a must. What's the alternative? Having everyone independently create their own DB connections?

[wry_discontent]

It's my preference to a point. I think you can over-do it. I've worked in systems that didn't use it and worked just fine. I would bet most folks err on the side of too little, unless they have some kind of framework doing the heavy lifting.