Hey everyone,
I've been working on some complex expressions in PHP and I'm trying to figure out the best way to control the order of evaluation. I know that PHP follows a specific order of operations, but I was wondering if I could use parentheses to override that and make sure certain parts of the expression are evaluated first.
For example, let's say I have an expression like this:
$a = 10 + 5 * 2;
According to the order of operations, multiplication should be done before addition. But what if I want to make sure the addition is done first? Can I just enclose it in parentheses like this?
$a = (10 + 5) * 2;
I hope that makes sense. Basically, I want to know if using parentheses can affect the order of evaluation in PHP. Any insights or examples would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks in advance for your help!

Hey there,
Yes, you can absolutely use parentheses in PHP to control the order of evaluation in complex expressions. Parentheses allow you to explicitly define which parts of the expression should be evaluated first, overriding the default order of operations.
In your example, enclosing the addition part in parentheses like this:
$a = (10 + 5) * 2;
will ensure that the addition is performed before the multiplication. So, the result will be 30, whereas without parentheses, the default order of operations would give you a result of 20.
I've personally used parentheses extensively in my PHP projects, especially when dealing with complex calculations or expressions with multiple operators. They are handy for making your intentions more explicit and reducing any ambiguity surrounding the order of evaluation.
I hope that clarifies things for you. If you have any more specific examples or questions, feel free to ask. Good luck with your PHP coding!
Best regards,
User 1