Title: what is this operator
Last modified: August 18, 2016

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# what is this operator

 *  [clovertech](https://wordpress.org/support/users/clovertech/)
 * (@clovertech)
 * [20 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/what-is-this-operator/)
 * what does the “->” mean. It is written everywhere in the code, i would just like
   to know what it means.

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)

 *  [niziol](https://wordpress.org/support/users/niziol/)
 * (@niziol)
 * [20 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/what-is-this-operator/#post-358002)
 * I believe it’s the tab character.
 *  [Phunky](https://wordpress.org/support/users/phunky/)
 * (@phunky)
 * [20 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/what-is-this-operator/#post-358004)
 * Thats is used on Object Vars
 * ie: $wpdb->get_results or $userdata->ID
 *  Thread Starter [clovertech](https://wordpress.org/support/users/clovertech/)
 * (@clovertech)
 * [20 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/what-is-this-operator/#post-358006)
 * i don’t think that is right. here is a line of code where this operator is used:
 * $metavalues = $wpdb->get_results(“SELECT meta_key, meta_value FROM $wpdb->usermeta
   WHERE user_id = ‘$user_id'”);
 *  [Cypher](https://wordpress.org/support/users/cypher/)
 * (@cypher)
 * [20 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/what-is-this-operator/#post-358012)
 * The “->” operator is a PHP construct to allow access to a particular Class’s 
   methods/properties.
 * In the case you’re talking about, the wpdb class provides a method called get_results
   that accepts a SQL query string and will return it’s result.
 * If any or all of this makes no sense to you, and you are not very inclined to
   learn about PHP programming, you can safely ignore it. 🙂
 * Regards

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)

The topic ‘what is this operator’ is closed to new replies.

 * In: [Fixing WordPress](https://wordpress.org/support/forum/how-to-and-troubleshooting/)
 * 4 replies
 * 4 participants
 * Last reply from: [Cypher](https://wordpress.org/support/users/cypher/)
 * Last activity: [20 years, 1 month ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/what-is-this-operator/#post-358012)
 * Status: not resolved

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