This came up while working on some code. I want to keep an internal counter within a function, and every time the function is called, return the incremented result. The function ended with return $i++; which, after I typed it, realized may not work as expected.
I wrote this quick test code to figure out what might happen.
<?php function increment() { static $count = 0; // do stuff return $count++; } for($i=0; $i<4; $i++) { echo 'i=' . $i . ' return=' . increment() . "n"; } ?>
I figured one of three things might happen:
Option 1: $count is never incremented because return returns the pre-incremented value and prevents it from incrementing.
i=0 return=0 i=1 return=0 i=2 return=0 i=3 return=0
Option 2: $count is incremented and the incremented value is passed to return.
i=0 return=1 i=1 return=2 i=2 return=3 i=3 return=4
Option 3: The current value of $count is evaluated and passed to the return, $count is incremented, then the function returns.
i=0 return=0 i=1 return=1 i=2 return=2 i=3 return=3
Well it turns out that the function does what I wanted it to do, option 3. Can you explain why the value of $count can be incremented after the function returns?
