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PHP PHP Basics Unit Converter Creating a Unit Conversion Tool

5 Answers

Benjamin Verspeak
Benjamin Verspeak
10,940 Points

From what I understand, When you run ($a++) it returns $a first and if you were to then var_dump($a) afterwards, it would now be 6.

So: <?php $a = 5; var_dump($a++); var_dump($a); ?>

will return: int(5) int(6)

Raphaël Seguin
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Raphaël Seguin
Full Stack JavaScript Techdegree Graduate 29,228 Points

Let's look at sequentially (the way the computer sees it) :

  • first : $a = 5;
    You assign the value 5 to the variable $a.
  • then : var_dump($a++); the var_dump() function displays the values of the arguments you pass it to. In our case, the argument is $a++. The expression $a++ does two things, in this order (the order is important) :
  • it returns the variable $a
  • then it increments the value of $a by one. So, since $a = 5, $a++ returns 5 and then var_dump($a++) returns 5. After that, the value of $a is incremented. You could easily check that if you wrote : var_dump($a++); var_dump($a); You'd see it doesn't show the same value the second time, because $a has been incremented after the first var_dump function was called but before the second one was called.

Does it help you to understand what's happening ?

cheers,

Raphaël

Raphaël Seguin
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Raphaël Seguin
Full Stack JavaScript Techdegree Graduate 29,228 Points

Hi, a++ returns the value of a, and then adds one to the value of a. ++a adds one to the value of a, and then returns the value of a.

cheers,

raphaël

Micah Doulos
Micah Doulos
17,663 Points

$a = 5; var_dump($a++);

=

$a = 5; Display the value of $a and afterwards add 1 (new value not displayed).

with var_dump($a++) you first dump the $a variable and after showing that variable it adds 1 to $a. with var_dump(++$a) it will first add 1 to $a and show it.