How does PHP's list function work?

Question

Hello my friends,

After recently answering a couple of questions here on SO that involved utilizing PHP's list function, I wondered, "how in the world does that function actually work under the hood?". I was thinking about something like using func_get_args() and then iterating through the argument list, and that's all nice and peachy, but then how in the world does the assignment part work?

   list(...) = array($x, $y, $z);

isn't this ^ evaluated first?

So to be precise, my question is how is the list function able to create scoped variables which get assigned to the not-yet evaluated array?

Thanks!

Answer 1

list is a language construct, not a function. It does not play by the rules of normal functions, it's more akin to an if or for (or array(), as the manual states), hard-coded into the PHP core.