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As we mentioned before, we don’t like surprises — they lead to mistakes. So, when we call a method, we’d like to know what type of value will be returned. This is done in the method definition.

The method definition must contain the type of the return value: if a method returns an integer, its return type must be int; if it returns text, it must be string, and so on. If the method returns nothing, use void.

If a method returns a type different from its stated return type, it will throw an error. Here are some common errors you may see —

This error means you must state a return type before the method name:

error CS1520: Method must have a return type

This error means that your method doesn’t return a value, when it should:

error CS0161: [MethodName]: not all code paths return a value

In some cases, this error means that your method returns a string when it should be an int (this one can be caused by a lot of things outside of methods):

error CS0029: Cannot implicitly convert type 'string' to 'int'

It’s important to remember that running into errors is a natural part of coding. As a teacher once put it “Great programmers understand that errors are part of the process, and they know how to find the solution to each while learning something new from them.”

Instructions

1.

This code has a bunch of errors! Run the code to find them.

2.

Fix the first error by adding a return type to one of the methods.

3.

Fix the second error by adding a return to one of the methods.

4.

Fix the last error by changing the return type of one of the methods.

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