@ in php

30 down vote accepted

The @ operator tells PHP to suppress error messages, so that they will not be shown. For instance, using: $result = mysql_query("this is an invalid query"); would result in a warning being shown, telling you that the MySQL query is invalid, while $result = @mysql_query("this is still an invalid query"); would not. Note, however, that this is very bad programming practice as it does not make error disappear, it just hides them, and it makes debugging a heck of a lot worse since you can't see what's actually wrong with your code.