... PHP 4 >= 4.0.0) compact -- Create array containing variables and their values . ... Each parameter can be either a string containing the name of the variable, or an array of variable names. The array can contain other arrays of variable names inside it; compact() handles it recursively. ... Example 1. compact() example . city = "San Francisco"; $state = "CA"; $event = "SIGGRAPH"; $location_vars = array ("city", "state"); $result = compact ("event", "nothing_here", $location_vars); . ...