What is return and when should i use them

[nocturne elm]

i just cannot understand very well how return works, even after watching tutorials.

like what is return for in these parts? Wouldn’t the script work even without them?

thats a simple assign plot on player join system btw

[opal oar]

return is used for

to return a value from function

it is used to get a value from the function

[nocturne elm]

so when he returns plotowners he can access that value in every part of the script?

and why does he return nil

[mild flint]

return is the same as return nil

theres no reason to do that

[mild flint]

the function's value becomes that

;compile

local function foo()
  return 1
end

local var = foo()
print(var)

[keen igloo]

Program Output

1

hilock_ | lua | lua-5.4.7 | wandbox.org

[nocturne elm]

alr i’ve understood this

what can this be useful for?

like in the script i’ve sent

[mild flint]

lots and lots of things

[nocturne elm]

some examples

so i can exercise

[bright dirge]

For example u want to find closest part

In few places in code

So you just make function that does that

And returns the part

Or u wanna format numbers to say 100k, 1m, not 100000 or 1000000

U just have function that does that and returns formatted

[nocturne elm]

like i make the function calculatr player distance from a part in the workspace then i return that function and that function will be the actual distance

from what i understood

[bright dirge]

Oh I thought u meant return in general

Let me check your code

[nocturne elm]

yes i mean return in general

but

even in that script i wanted to understand what return does there

so i can understand it

[mild flint]

the get plot owners function?

[nocturne elm]

yea the other ones too if u want

[mild flint]

it returns the plot owners

here it takes in a plot, and returns that player's plot by looping through all of the plots until it hits a plot with the owner being that player

and if it doesn't find it, it returns nil

but thats completely useless since that would happen anyway

[nocturne elm]

alright i kinda get it now

so by returning the plot

the plot will be = to player if i want to use it later in the script

[mild flint]

what

[nocturne elm]

i mean

i can do this without returning

[mild flint]

how can you do that

[nocturne elm]

wait

i understood what return does now

but by returning plot there

what i am achiewving

[mild flint]

you get the plot

in a script you can use PlotService:GetPlot() to get a plot

[nocturne elm]

mhh okay

thanks

i get it now still a bit confused but i kinda understand it now

ill exercise

[mild flint]

it's about abstraction

you make some code, and then you can reuse it later

and you don't have to know what the function does inside

you can just get the plot using PlotService:GetPlot