Multiple returns from a function

Question

Is it possible to have a function with two returns like this   function test  testvar         Do something    return  var1    return  var2      If so  how would I be able to get each return separately

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I have implement like this for multiple return value PHP function  be nice with your code  thank you      lt  php     function multi retun  aa                return array 1 3  aa             list  one  two  three  multi retun 55       echo  one      echo  two      echo  three        gt

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You can return multiple arrays and scalars from a function  function x          a array  a   b   c         b array  e   f        return array  x   a  b      list   m  n  o  x     echo  m   n   print r  n   print r  o

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Or you can pass by reference   function byRef  x   amp  a   amp  b         a   10    x       b   100    x      a   0   b   0   byRef 10   a   b    echo  a     n   echo  b    This would output  100 1000

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I had a similar problem - so I tried around and googled a bit  finding this thread   After 5 minutes of try and error I found out that you can simply use  AND  to return two  maybe more - not tested yet  in one line of return   My code     function get id        global  b id   f id         stuff happens     return  b id AND  f id          later in the code    get id      var dump  b id     var dump  f id      tested output by var dump   it works  I got both the values I expected to get should get  I hope I could help anybody reading this thread

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use globals like     lt  php  function t  a      global  add   noadd    add  a  a    noadd  a      a 1  t  a   echo  noadd      add    gt    This will echo 1 2

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For PHP 7 1 0 onwards  you can use the new syntax  instead of the list function          return  array   foo  bar     function getFooAndBar    array       return   foo    bar         foo   bar    getFooAndBar     print  Hello     foo     and      bar    It s OK for me if you want to return 2-3 variables  otherwise you should use an object with the desired properties

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Yes  you can use an object  -   But the simplest way is to return an array   return array  value1    value2    value3

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I think eliego has explained the answer clearly  But if you want to return both values  put them into a array and return it   function test  testvar         do something    return array  var1   gt  var1  var2   gt  var2     defining a key would be better some times          to access return values   returned values   test  testvar    echo  returned values  var1    echo  returned values  var2

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In your example  the second return will never happen - the first return is the last thing PHP will run  If you need to return multiple values  return an array   function test  testvar         return array  var1   var2       result   test  testvar   echo  result 0       var1 echo  result 1       var2

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Add all variables in an array and then finally return the array   function test  testvar         do something   return array  var1    gt   var1   var2    gt   var2       And then    myTest   test  myTestVar      myTest  var1   and  myTest  var2   will be usable

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There is no way of returning 2 variables   Although  you can propagate an array and return it  create a conditional to return a dynamic variable  etc   For instance  this function would return  var2  function wtf  blahblah   true         var1    ONe        var2    tWo        if  blahblah     true          return  var2            return  var1      In application   echo wtf      would echo  tWo echo wtf  not true  this is false      would echo  ONe   If you wanted them both  you could modify the function a bit  function wtf  blahblah   true         var1    ONe        var2    tWo        if  blahblah     true          return  var2             if  blahblah     both           return array  var1   var2              return  var1     echo wtf  both   0    would echo  ONe echo wtf  both   1    would echo  tWo  list  first   second    wtf  both      value of  first would be  var1  value of  second would be  var2

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This is the easiest way to do it   public function selectAllUsersByRole  userRole   selector          this- gt userRole    userLevel       this- gt selector    selector        sql    SELECT   FROM users WHERE role  lt     AND del stat   0        stm    this- gt connect  - gt prepare  sql      Connect function in Dbh connect to database file      stm- gt execute   this- gt userRole       This is PHP 7  Use array  this- gt userRole  for PHP 5       usersIdArray   array         usersFNameArray   array         usersLNameArray   array         if  stm- gt rowCount              while  row    stm- gt fetch                   array push  usersIdArray      row  id                 array push  usersFNameArray   row  f name                 array push  usersLNameArray   row  l name                     You can return only  row  id   or f name or                    I used the array because it s most used                      if  this- gt selector    1            return  usersIdArray       elseif  this- gt selector    2            return  usersFNameArray       elseif  this- gt selector    3            return  usersLNameArray             How can we call this function    idData    selectAllUsers- gt selectAllUsersByLevel  userRole  0   print r  idData    idFName    selectAllUsers- gt selectAllUsersByLevel  userRole  1   print r  idFname     That s it  Very easy

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Functions in PHP can return only one variable  you could use variables with global scope  you can return array  or you can pass variable by reference to the function and than change value    but all of that will decrease readability of your code   I would suggest that you look into the classes

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lt  php function foo       you   5     me   10    return  you    return  me     echo foo      output is just 5 alone so we cant get second one it only retuns first one so better go with array   function goo       you   5     me   10    return  you and me    array  you  me      var dump goo        var dump result is array 2     0   gt  int 5   1   gt  int 10    i think thats fine enough    gt

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In PHP 5 5 there is also a new concept  generators  where you can yield multiple values from a function   function hasMultipleValues         yield  value1       yield  value2       values   hasMultipleValues    foreach   values as  val            val will first be  value1  then  value2

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Some might prefer returning multiple values as object   function test          object   new stdClass          object- gt x    value 1        object- gt y    value 2        return  object      And call it like this   echo test  - gt x    Or    test   test    echo  test- gt y

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You can get the values of two or more variables by setting them by reference   function t  amp  a   amp  b         a   1       b   2      t  a   b    echo  a           b    Output   1 2

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Technically  you can t return more than one value  However  there are multiple ways to work around that limitation  The way that acts most like returning multiple values  is with the list keyword  function getXYZ         return array 4 5 6      list  x  y  z    getXYZ        Afterwards   x    4  amp  amp   y    5  amp  amp   z    6     This will hold for all samples unless otherwise noted   Technically  you re returning an array and using list to store the elements of that array in different values instead of storing the actual array  Using this technique will make it feel most like returning multiple values  The list solution is a rather php-specific one  There are a few languages with similar structures  but more languages that don t  There s another way that s commonly used to  quot return quot  multiple values and it s available in just about every language  in one way or another   However  this method will look quite different so may need some getting used to     note that I named the arguments  a   b and  c to show that    they don t need to be named  x   y and  z function getXYZ  amp  a   amp  b   amp  c         a   4       b   5       c   6      getXYZ  x   y   z    This technique is also used in some functions defined by php itself  e g   count in str replace   matches in preg match   This might feel quite different from returning multiple values  but it is worth at least knowing about  A third method is to use an object to hold the different values you need  This is more typing  so it s not used quite as often as the two methods above  It may make sense to use this  though  when using the same set of variables in a number of places  or of course  working in a language that doesn t support the above methods or allows you to do this without extra typing   class MyXYZ       public  x      public  y      public  z     function getXYZ          out   new MyXYZ              out- gt x   4       out- gt y   5       out- gt z   6           return  out      xyz   getXYZ      x    xyz- gt x   y    xyz- gt y   z    xyz- gt z   The above methods sum up the main ways of returning multiple values from a function  However  there are variations on these methods  The most interesting variations to look at  are those in which you are actually returning an array  simply because there s so much you can do with arrays in PHP  First  we can simply return an array and not treat it as anything but an array  function getXYZ         return array 1 2 3       array   getXYZ      x    array 0    y    array 1    z    array 2    The most interesting part about the code above is that the code inside the function is the same as in the very first example I provided  only the code calling the function changed  This means that it s up to the one calling the function how to treat the result the function returns  Alternatively  one could use an associative array  function getXYZ         return array  x    gt  4                    y    gt  5                    z    gt  6       array   getXYZ      x    array  x     y    array  y     z    array  z     Php does have the compact function that allows you to do same as above but while writing less code   Well  the sample won t have less code  but a real world application probably would   However  I think the amount of typing saving is minimal and it makes the code harder to read  so I wouldn t do it myself  Nevertheless  here s a sample  function getXYZ          x   4       y   5       z   6           return compact  x    y    z        array   getXYZ      x    array  x     y    array  y     z    array  z     It should be noted that while compact does have a counterpart in extract that could be used in the calling code here  but since it s a bad idea to use it  especially for something as simple as this  I won t even give a sample for it  The problem is that it will do  quot magic quot  and create variables for you  while you can t see which variables are created without going to other parts of the code  Finally  I would like to mention that list doesn t really play well with associative array  The following will do what you expect  function getXYZ         return array  x    gt  4                    y    gt  5                    z    gt  6       array   getXYZ     list  x   y   z    getXYZ     However  the following will do something different  function getXYZ         return array  x    gt  4                    z    gt  6                    y    gt  5       array   getXYZ     list  x   y   z    getXYZ        Pay attention   y    6  amp  amp   z    5  If you used list with an associative array  and someone else has to change the code in the called function in the future  which may happen just about any situation  it may suddenly break  so I would recommend against combining list with associative arrays

User · Answer

Languages which allow multiple returns usually just convert the multiple values into a data structure   For example  in Python you can return multiple values  However  they re actually just being returned as one tuple   So you can return multiple values in PHP by just creating a simple array and returning that

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The answer is no  When the parser reaches the first return statement  it will direct control back to the calling function - your second return statement will never be executed

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Since PHP 7 1 we have proper destructuring for lists  Thereby you can do things like this    test    1  2  3  4     a   b   c   d     test  echo  a    gt  1 echo  d    gt  4   In a function this would look like this   function multiple return         return   this    is    a    test         first   second   third   fourth    multiple return    echo  first    gt  this echo  fourth    gt  test   Destructuring is a very powerful tool  It s capable of destructuring key  value pairs as well     a    gt   a   b    gt   b   c    gt   c      a    gt  1   b    gt  2   c    gt  3     Take a look at the new feature page for PHP 7 1   New features

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Its not possible have two return statement  However it doesn t throw error but when function is called you will  receive only first return statement value  We can use return of array to get multiple values in return  For Example   function test  testvar         do something     just assigning a string for example  we can assign any operation result    var1    result1      var2    result2     return array  value1    gt   var1   value2    gt   var2

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The answer that s given the green tick above is actually incorrect   You can return multiple values in PHP  if you return an array   See the following code for an example    lt  php  function small numbers         return array  0  1  2      list   zero   one   two    small numbers      This code is actually copied from the following page on PHP s website  http   php net manual en functions returning-values php I ve also used the same sort of code many times myself  so can confirm that it s good and that it works

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Thought I would expand on a few of the responses from above      class nameCheck   public  name   public function   construct         this- gt name    name     function firstName                   If a name has been entered       if  empty  this- gt name             name    this- gt name           errflag   false                         Return a array with both the name and errflag         return array  name   errflag                  If its empty        else if empty  this- gt name             errmsg    Please enter a name             errflag   true                         Return both the Error message and Flag         return array  errmsg   errflag                if   POST  submit       a   new nameCheck   a- gt name     POST  name        Assign a list of variables from the firstName function list  name   err     a- gt firstName        Display the values   echo  Name       name  echo  Errflag       err       gt   lt form method  post  action   lt  php   SERVER  PHP SELF      gt    gt   lt input name  name     gt   lt input type  submit  name  submit  value  submit    gt   lt  form gt    This will give you a input field and a submit button once submitted  if the name input field is empty it will return the error flag and a message  If the name field has a value it will return the value name and a error flag of 0 for false   no errors  Hope this helps

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I know that I am pretty late  but there is a nice and simple solution for this problem  It s possible to return multiple values at once using destructuring   function test         return    model    gt   someValue     data    gt   someothervalue        Now you can use this   result   test    extract  result     extract creates a variable for each member in the array  named after that member  You can therefore now access  model and  data

User · Answer

Yes and no  You can t return more than one variable   object  but as you suggest  you can put them into an array and return that    There is no limit to the nesting of arrays  so you can just package them up that way to return

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You can always only return one variable which might be an array  But You can change global variables from inside the function  That is most of the time not very good style  but it works  In classes you usually change class varbiables from within functions without returning them

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Functions  by definition  only return one value   However  as you assumed  that value can be an array   So you can certainly do something like    lt  PHP function myfunc  a  b      return array  foo   gt  a  bar   gt  b     print r myfunc  baz   bork       That said  it s worth taking a moment and thinking about whatever you re trying to solve   While returning a complex result value  like an array  or an object  is perfectly valid  if you re thinking is that  I want to return two values   you might be designing poorly   Without more detail in your question  it s hard to say  but it never hurts to stop and think twice

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var1   0   var2   0   function test  testvar   amp  var1    amp  var2       var1   1     var2   2    return    test      var1   var2       var1   1  var2   2     It s not a good way  but I think we can set two variables in a function at the same time

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Best Practice is to put your returned variables into array and then use list   to assign array values to variables    lt  php  function add subt  val1   val2         add    val1    val2       subt    val1 -  val2       return array  add   subt      list  add result   subt result    add subt 20  7   echo  Add       add result     lt br   gt    echo  Subtract       subt result     lt br   gt       gt

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Does PHP still use  out parameters   If so  you can use the syntax to modify one or more of the parameters going in to your function then  You would then be free to use the modified variable after your function returns

[php] Multiple returns from a function

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