How return $this->address[$type] ?? []; work?

Question

I just encounter a syntax expression while working with laravel model.

  public function address($type)
    {
        return $this->address[$type] ?? [];
    }

I don't understand how does this

 return $this->address[$type] ?? [];

Work?

Possible duplicate of [Reference — What does this symbol mean in PHP?](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/3737139/reference-what-does-this-symbol-mean-in-php) — Daniel, Aug 03 '18 at 08:39

score 4 · Accepted Answer · answered Aug 03 '18 at 08:32

4

It's the null coalescing operation (see more at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_coalescing_operator#PHP). It's a syntactic shortcut for isset, really:

return $this->address[$type] ?? [];

can be read as:

if (isset($this->address[$type])) {
  return $this->address[$type];
} else {
  return [];
}

answered Aug 03 '18 at 08:32

Adam Wright

1

Should note that this operation is only available in PHP 7+. – Jason Grim Aug 03 '18 at 09:16

1 Answers1