How to return multiple values from a function

Question

I'm building a script to work with PxPost from Payment Express and I've used their sample code as can be found at http://www.paymentexpress.com/Technical_Resources/Sample_code_-_PHP/PX_Post_-_cURL.aspx

How it works: It's built into an automated script that queries orders from my database, processes them, and returns a value.

My only problem is I want the function to return more than one value, so this is what I've done.

Code to run through functions (Line 201):

$once_complete = process_request($billingID, $order_total, $merchRef);

Which send the payment to be processed, that then gets the returns and processes the XML using the sample code. At the end of the code I've removed all the $html info and just replaced it with the following (line 111):

return $CardHolderResponseDescription.":".$MerchantResponseText.":".$AuthCode.":".$MerchantError;

Which should as far as I understand, return that to what started it. I then want to split those values and return them as strings using the following (line 202):

list($RespDesc, $MerchResp, $AuthCode, $MerchError) = explode(":", $once_complete);

But for some reason that's not working.

I've tried echo-ing the return and it works fine then, but then after that it seems to disappear. What may be going wrong?

You can see the entire page's code at http://pastebin.com/LJjFutne. This code is a work in progress.

Instead of packing the values like that, consider returning an array (or even better, create a class to hold these values and return an object of that class). Please stop writing new code with the ancient mysql_* functions. They are no longer maintained and community has begun the [deprecation process](http://news.php.net/php.internals/53799). Instead you should learn about prepared statements and use either [PDO](http://php.net/pdo) or [MySQLi](http://php.net/mysqli). If you care to learn, [here is a quite good PDO-related tutorial](http://wiki.hashphp.org/PDO_Tutorial_for_MySQL_Developers). — DCoder, Sep 19 '12 at 09:25
@DCoder Thanks for the tip. I'm reading that now. Will start converting my script. :). Would returning an array work with it being processed in the loops like it is? — dpDesignz, Sep 19 '12 at 09:27

Linkmichiel · Accepted Answer · 2013-01-28T05:50:55.220

10

Return an array.

function process_request(){
    ...
    return array( $CardHolderResponseDescription, $MerchantResponseText, $AuthCode, $MerchantError );
}

And pick it up via:

$_result = process_request();
$CardHolderResponseDescription = $_result[0];
$MerchantResponseText = $_result[1];
...

Tip: use shorter vars for better reading :)

edited Jan 28 '13 at 05:50

answered Sep 19 '12 at 09:31

Linkmichiel

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Thanks but for some reason it's still not returning anything to me. I plan on dropping them down once it's setup. :) – dpDesignz Sep 19 '12 at 09:49
Wow thanks! I should have read this code properly the first time. Worked a treat. :D – dpDesignz Sep 19 '12 at 10:00
Elegant solution¡ Thanks. – Jam Jul 26 '18 at 15:32

score 1 · Answer 2 · edited Feb 02 '20 at 20:32

1

In your function process_request:

return array($CardHolderResponseDescription, $MerchantResponseText, $AuthCode, $MerchantError);

When calling your function:

list($RespDesc, $MerchResp, $AuthCode, $MerchError) = process_request($billingID,$order_total,$merchRef);

edited Feb 02 '20 at 20:32

Peter Mortensen

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answered Sep 19 '12 at 09:28

Alain Tiemblo

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Thanks but for some reason it's still not returning anything to me – dpDesignz Sep 19 '12 at 09:49

score 1 · Answer 3 · edited Feb 02 '20 at 20:33

1

The simplest thing you can do is putting the return values in an array which you can access later:

return array("CardHolderResponseDescription"=>$CardHolderResponseDescription, "MerchantResponseText" => $MerchantResponseText, "AuthCode" => $AuthCode );

And later:

list($RespDesc, $MerchResp, $AuthCode, $MerchError) = $my_return_value

edited Feb 02 '20 at 20:33

Peter Mortensen

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answered Sep 19 '12 at 09:33

Ramon Ott

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How to return multiple values from a function

3 Answers3