How do you pass objects by reference in PHP 5?

Question

In PHP 5, are you required to use the & modifier to pass by reference? For example,

class People() { }
$p = new People();
function one($a) {         


        

Answer 1

You're using it wrong. The $ sign is compulsory for any variable. It should be: http://php.net/manual/en/language.references.pass.php

function foo(&$a)
{
$a=null;
}


foo($a);
To return a reference, use

 function &bar($a){
$a=5;
return $a

 }

In objects and arrays, a reference to the object is copied as the formal parameter, any equality operations on two objects is a reference exchange.

$a=new People();
$b=$a;//equivalent to &$b=&$a roughly. That is the address of $b is the same as that of $a 

function goo($obj){
//$obj=$e(below) which essentially passes a reference of $e to $obj. For a basic datatype such as string, integer, bool, this would copy the value, but since equality between objects is anyways by references, this results in $obj as a reference to $e
}
$e=new People();
goo($e);