Likely scope error

[Anon]

Right, well, I appear to have a scope problem here, where something can't see or edit a variable. Basically the code is as follows:

$current is set to "entrance" with the use of find_room()

do_action($current) is called. This does some logic and then prints.. eh, well, it's $objects[$_REQUEST["obj"]]->results[$actnum], but suffice it to say that it's a string.

The string, in this case, is just "..." . do_portal() . "..."

do_portal() does this:
global $current;
$current = "maze1";
return;

But $current doesn't get set globally. do_action knows what $current is all the time, and as far as it knows, it remains constant while it calls the string. The string doesn't know what $current is at all, before it is set via do_portal(), and $current doesn't exist as far as do_portal() knows either. The string knows that $current is changed by do_portal().

Make sense? Need more information and/or clarification? Better still, know any way of fixing it? Oh. Fine then.

[Anon]

There are two things that don't look right to me. Function "do_action" takes a parameter called $current. Function "do_portal" refers to a global variable also called $current, but the two variables named $current cannot be the same. The default in php is to pass a parameter by value, so even if the global variable was passed into do_action, inside the function it has a local copy, not a reference to the global (check the docs for how to pass by reference).

Also, the string concatenates the value returned by do_portal, but the "return" statement of do_portal does not have a value to be returned.

[Anon]

The name of the variable that's passed to do_action is called $room inside the function, so I doubt that's the probably. In fact... now that I look at it, there's really no reason for $current to be passed to do_action at all. ::removes:: But it still doesn't work.

do_portal returns nothing because it should be transparent, and just do things, so there's no reason for a value to be returned.

[Anon]

Maybe if you post the real code instead of descriptions of what you think it should be doing...

[Anon]

... Very well then. Be prepared to bruise your eyes.

// Don't try this at home:
function do_portal() {
global $current;
$current = "maze1";
return $current;
}

$objects["portal"] = new Object();
$objects["portal"]->results = array("...".$current." ".do_portal()." ".$current."...");

define("START", "entrance");

function find_room($start) {
global $objects;
if (isset($REQUEST["loc"])) {
if (!isset($objects[$REQUEST["loc"]])) {
$REQUEST["error"] = 5; die(error_msgs() . "<a href=\"./\">BACK TO START</a>\n\n</body>");
} elseif (!isset($objects[$REQUEST["loc"]]->n_to)) {
$REQUEST["error"] = 6; die(error_msgs() . "<a href=\"./\">BACK TO START</a>\n\n</body>");
} else {
return $REQUEST["loc"];
}
} else {
return $start;
}
}

function do_action() {
global $objects;
if (!isset($REQUEST["act"])) {
return;
} elseif (!isset($REQUEST["obj"])) {
$REQUEST["error"] = 2; return error_msgs(); // No object.
} elseif (!isset($objects[$REQUEST["obj"]])) {
$REQUEST["error"] = 3; return error_msgs(); // Object does not exist.
} elseif (isset($objects[$REQUEST["obj"]]->n_to)) {
$REQUEST["error"] = 4; return error_msgs(); // Object is a room.
} else {
foreach ($objects[($REQUEST["obj"])]->actions as $i => $j) {
if ($j == $REQUEST["act"]) {
$actnum = $i;
}
}
if (!isset($actnum)) {
$REQUEST["error"] = 8; return error_msgs();
} elseif (!isset($objects[$REQUEST["obj"]]->results[$actnum])) {
$REQUEST["error"] = 7; return error_msgs();
} else {
global $current;
print $current;
return $objects[$_REQUEST["obj"]]->results[$actnum] . " " . $current . "<br /><br />";
}
}
}

$current = find_room(START);

print do_action();