Question

If I go

variable1 =+ variable2
variable1 += variable2

I get the same result for variable1.

So is there any difference?

Answer 1

The difference is that your observation is not correct and variable1 =+ variable2 does not add variable2 to variable1, but rather sets variable1 equal to variable2. The line is really variable1 = +variable2, or simply variable1 = variable2.

Consider this code

int a = 10;
int b = 20;

a =+ b;
a += b;

At the end of this process, a equals 40. It is intialized to 10, b is initialized to 20, a is set equal to b, and then b gets added to a.