Returns a previous answer from the Home screen.
ans([integer]).
Menu Location
2nd, ANS (the (-) key)
This command works on all calculators.
X byte(s)
Simply put, the ans() function returns an answer that the calculator has already returned. The argument specifies which answer to return, and must be an integer between 1 and 99 and may not be an expression or a variable. For example ans(1), the default, will return the last answer displayed on the home screen. ans(3), however, will return return the third most recent answer. If no argument is provided, the calculator assumes 1. Strangely, while official documentation states that the argument must be between 1 and 99, 0 may be used, which returns the same answer as if 1 were used (this is probably why ans() returns the most recent answer, even though no argument is provided).
Example home screen input to generate the Fibonacci sequence.
:1
1
:1
1
:ans(1)+ans(2)
2
:ans(1)+ans(2)
3
Advanced Uses
When entered into a program, the calculator will automatically change the ans() command into whatever value it represents at runtime, so that even if the home screen changes, the program will always return the same value of the ans() function as the first time it was run. This may be avoided by using the expr() function and putting the ans() function in quotes to make it a string. For example: expr("ans(3)"). This can be rather cumbersome, however, and generally anything that you can do with the ans() function can be accomplished equally well with a variable.
Error Conditions
260 - Domain error happens when the argument is not in the range 1-99 or the argument is not an integer.
380 - Invalid ans() happens when that many answers haven't been stored yet.
620 - Invalid variable or function name happens when the user attempts to store a value to ans().