[SOLVED] Desparation: References do not work as expected

[yassen]

Hello guys, first post here.

I am really desparate about how references (do not) work in PHP.

Here's a code snippet:

[code]
var $data;
var $_children;
var $_uniqueNames;

function &add(&$child) {
$name = $child->data->name;
if (array_key_exists($name, $this->_uniqueNames)) {
return $this->_uniqueNames[$name];
}
$this->_children[] =& $child;
$this->_uniqueNames[$name] =& $child; // we register the name
$true = TRUE;
return $true;
}
[/code]

This is part of a simple Node class prepared to build trees. A Node remembers the names of its children and refuses to add a new child with a name already registered. Everything seems to work except the return value in case there is an attempt to add a child with an already registered name -- my client code always gets NULL whatever I do!
I would appreciate any idea of why is that and how can I fix it, thanks in advance!
Yassen

[yassen]

My worst fears are justified:

Not only newbies fail to understand how references work in PHP, nobody really knows  :-\

[Chetan]

You would have 2 use the function twice~~
and if you are trying to print the value please dont forget like noobs that you need to use echo if you use return, it just does not echo it.

[yassen]

Thanks, RockingGroudon!
I finally got it -- it was my mistake, erroneous code in a wrapper function that substituted the return value for something else. Thanks again!