Shorthand unary operators

The = operator is special in that you can combine it with other operators. For example, to turn > (greater than) into greater than or equals, add the equals sign to the end - >=. You can add an equals sign to each of the first six operators in the list, forming +=, -=, *=, /=, and .=, and these become unary operators, like this:

<?php

      $somevar = 5;

      $somevar += 5; // $somevar is now 10

      $somevar *= 2; // $somevar is now 20

      $somevar .= " elephants"; // $somevar is now "20 elephants"
 ?>

The unary versions of these operators are really just shorthand, but they are a little easier to read also.

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