javascript syntax

Question

   var ret = [] 
             ,xresult = document.evaluate(exp, rootEl, null,
                         XPathResult.UNORDERED_NODE_ITERATOR_TYPE, null)
             ,result = xresult.iterateNext();
   while (result) {
     ret[ret.length]= result;
     result = xresult.iterateNext();
   }

can anyone explain me what is the ret = [],..,... syntax? Initializing array?

Answer 1

You're right. This code:

var ret = [] 
             ,xresult = document.evaluate(exp, rootEl, null,
                         XPathResult.UNORDERED_NODE_ITERATOR_TYPE, null)
             ,result = xresult.iterateNext();

Could be rewritten as:

var ret = [];
var xresult = document.evaluate(exp, rootEl, null,
                         XPathResult.UNORDERED_NODE_ITERATOR_TYPE, null);
var result = xresult.iterateNext();

var foo = []; initializes foo as an empty array.