>>Actually, as Bonnie sort of pointed out, using 'ref' in this context is pointless since when passing the DataSet object you're passing a reference anyway. 'ref' is really only of use when passing value types (integers etc.)
>
>I see. Thank you. And as I already mentioned to John, I decided to do away with passing the data set at all and instead return it from the called method.

Viv says tht "ref" is really only of use when passing value types, and he's correct about that. However, I wanted to point out that "ref" is necessary with strings too (if you are going to be modifying the string in your method and expect to use it after the method call in the calling code, as would be the case for evaluating an ErrorMessage, for example).

~~Bonnie