-- Posted by Majo at 12:55 pm on Oct. 29, 2008 Code: public boolean validateScore(int score) { if((score >= 0) && (score <= 100)) { return true; } return false; } What exactly is going on here? If the condition is met, "return true". If it's not, "return false"....which means?... What do the return statements, in this case, do? -- Posted by UltimaTaz at 12:57 pm on Oct. 29, 2008 Looks like it's a fail-fail test. -- Posted by Ethryx at 12:57 pm on Oct. 29, 2008 The function will return true if the score is between 0 and 100, including 0 and 100. If its lower then 0 or higher then 100 then it will return false. -- Posted by Majo at 1:03 pm on Oct. 29, 2008 Quote: from Ethryx at 3:57 pm on Oct. 29, 2008 The function will return true if the score is between 0 and 100, including 0 and 100. If its lower then 0 or higher then 100 then it will return false. But how does that validate the value? I mean...what does that do? True/False doesn't get printed out so what happens? You call the method and then...it checks...but then what happens with/to the true/false? -- Posted by Ethryx at 1:28 pm on Oct. 29, 2008 Quote: from Majo at 4:03 pm on Oct. 29, 2008 Quote: from Ethryx at 3:57 pm on Oct. 29, 2008 The function will return true if the score is between 0 and 100, including 0 and 100. If its lower then 0 or higher then 100 then it will return false.   But how does that validate the value? I mean...what does that do? True/False doesn't get printed out so what happens? You call the method and then...it checks...but then what happens with/to the true/false? Let me put this into a real example for you: int Score = 85; boolean ScoreValid; ScoreValid = validateScore(Score); if(ScoreValid == true) { // put coding here when the user entered a valid score between 0 and 100 } else { // this would be an error since the score is either lower then 0 or higher then 100. tell the user to re-enter the score } ** As you can see, the function validateScore (which you wrote the coding to above) is going to return a true/false value to, in this case, the variable ScoreValid based on the integer that is passed too it (Score). If the variable Score contains a number between 0 and 100, ScoreValid will be true because validateScore will set it to true. If it is below 0 or above 100, ScoreValid will be false because validateScore will set it to false. The user of this java program does not see this true/false value. This is just a way of checking that a valid 'score' was submitted and not something else. Hope that helps, let me know if you still don't understand. -- Posted by matto at 6:22 pm on Oct. 29, 2008 'boolean' is a data type that holds two possible values: true or false.  Just like 'int' and 'char' are kinds of data types. This means that any boolean value, once computed, will have a value of true or false. Some examples of boolean values: true false (x > 7) (true if x is > 7, false if x<=7) validateScore(100) (true) validateScore(30) (true) validateScore(-5) (false) The method 'validateScore' returns a boolean value to wherever it is called.  These boolean values can be used in if() statements and while() statements, and places like that. Within the () there must be a boolean value.