What is the purpose of using the & symbol in function calls in PHP?

When using the & symbol in function calls in PHP, it is used to pass arguments by reference rather than by value. This means that any changes made to the argument within the function will also affect the original variable outside of the function. This can be useful when you want to modify a variable directly without creating a copy of it. Example: 

function increment(&$num) {
    $num++;
}

$number = 5;
increment($number);
echo $number; // Output: 6

Keywords

PHP function calls & pass by reference memory optimization

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