Question

function myfunc ()
{
    $a['foo'] = 'bar';
    $a['baz'] = 'qux';

    return $a;
}

How do you do it so that when you call $a = myfunc(); you can use echo $a->foo; and it will output bar?

Additional question: Having that simple function above, is it better to return an array or object?

Answer 1

Just cast it as an object.

function myfunc ()
{
    $a['foo'] = 'bar';
    $a['baz'] = 'qux';

    return (object)$a;
}

As for which one you want, it’s up to you. It depends on what you are doing with the returned object or array.