how to remove array passed into function

[adrive]

how does one totally remove an array passed into a function?

php.net already stated that unset called within function will not remove the element passed in.

I tried nulling and unsetting each element in a loop, not working.
Not even setting the whole array to null??

$arrHead = array("badana","cap","scarf");

killHead($arrHead);
echo "<br>arrHead count ". count($arrHead);

function killHead(&$arrHead){

 foreach($arrHead as $key){
	$arrHead[$key] = null;
	unset($arrHead[$key]);
 }
 unset($arrHead);
 $arrHead = null;
}

[adrive]

oops, please ignore this.

i forgot to type $key => $value

unsetting works if we unset array elements one by one

[laserlight]

Most likely you want to write:

function killHead(&$arrHead) {
    $arrHead = array();
}

There is no point unsetting the elements one by one when you simply want an empty array.

[bradgrafelman]

As laserlight points out in his code, adding an ampersand ('&') in front of a parameter in the function's parameter list changes the pass-by-value method of calling the function to a pass-by-reference; this means that any changes you make to that parameter inside the function are actually being made to the original variable you passed to that function.

EDIT: After all this time, I still referenced laserlight as a female... darn you and your avatar, laserlight! :p