accessing the return value of called procedure

this is one way of creating a stored procedure in mysql:

CREATE PROCEDURE some_procedure (IN value1, OUT value2)
BEGIN
  SELECT ... INTO value2 FROM ....
END//


and if called from another procedure, i can access the variable this way:

CREATE PROCEDURE another_procedure (....)
BEGIN
  DECLARE count INT;
  ...
  CALL some_procedure(..., count);
  IF (count ... ) THEN
  END IF;
  ...
  ...
END//


there is another way of creating a stored procedure in mysql without
using a variable:

CREATE PROCEDURE some_procedure (IN value1)
BEGIN
  SELECT ... FROM ....
END//


if i were to use this way, how can i access the return value?

CREATE PROCEDURE another_procedure (....)
BEGIN
  ...
  CALL some_procedure(...); <==== how to access the value?
  ...
  ...
END//


i tried several ways:

1) SET count = CALL some_procedure(...);
2) IF ((CALL some_procedure(...)) ...) THEN

but both produce an error.

- wrote:
 > i tried several ways:
 >
 > 1) SET count = CALL some_procedure(...);
 > 2) IF ((CALL some_procedure(...)) ...) THEN
 >
 > but both produce an error.

A procedure that returns a value instead of having an OUT parameter is
called a FUNCTION. This is created with the CREATE FUNCTION statement.
Functions are very similar to procedures, except that they cannot
reference any tables; that is, they can't perform queries.

Looking in the grammar source code for MySQL 5.0.2, there _appears_ to
be support for queries of the form:
SELECT * FROM PROCEDURE procname();
But I can't get it to work. It might be an unfinished feature. We are
using 5.0 alpha, after all.

Is it a problem to use a variable and fill it by passing it as an OUT
parameter to the procedure?

Regards,
Bill K.