Append string to array elements and join them in one expression

Question

Let's assume I have an array

> words=(foo bar baz)

Now I can join the elements

> echo ${(j., .)words}
foo, bar, baz

And I can append a string to the elements:

> echo ${^words}yeah
fooyeah baryeah bazyeah

With the following, I can append and join the elements:

> wordsyeah=(${^words}yeah)
> echo ${(j., .)wordsyeah}
fooyeah, baryeah, bazyeah

Is it possible to do print "fooyeah, baryeah, bazyeah" in a single expression, i.e. without using additional variables?

Bonus: Can I print that without using any variables at all?

As far as I can tell, this boils down to running parameter expansion on strings, but I wasn't able to find out how (or if) that is possible.

Answer 1

The answer is

> print ${(j., .)${:-${^words}yeah}}
fooyeah, baryeah, bazyeah

or

> print ${(j., .)${:-{foo,bar,baz}yeah}}
fooyeah, baryeah, bazyeah

without using variables at all

The critical part is ${name:-word}. It is explained in the manual.

${name-word}
${name:-word}

If name is set, or in the second form is non-null, then substitute its value; otherwise substitute word. In the second form name may be omitted, in which case word is always substituted.

Thanks to phy1729 from #zsh for pointing this out to me :)