> I was wondering if when you say there is no standard, do you mean that the number returned is not a standard or the level of strength ASSIGNED to that number is not a standard (i.e. good, strong, excellent, etc.).

Effective bit length of a password is a standard measurement. But their segregation into groups is artificial. On my keyboard, for instance, I find keys for ö ä ü and ß. I considers those keys to be characters and are would use them as likely as a b c, etc. in a password. That means, on my German keyboard, lower case alpha has 30 members and upper case characters have 29. On your keyboard you can only enter them by holding down the ALT key and typing their ANSI code on the num pad, or by switching the keyboard layout.

There's also no standard how many bits a secure password should have.