thanks craig. just so i understand (in my layman way), "it breaks encapsulation" b/c i'm using a variable outside the scope of an object that could have been created in another program, and an object is supposed to have all its data and methods contained within the object. If i send a local variable from the object to an outside function, that variable is only being used within that specific object and cannot be used outside of it.

I'm still learning but want to see if my understanding makes sense.

paul