Default and Optional Parameters

Optional parameters are really just shortcuts to overloading methods. There are two ways to indicate that a parameter is optional. The obvious way is to use the Optional keyword, like so:

aMethod(aString as String, Optional anInteger as Integer) 

The second way is to establish a default value for one of the parameters. Another way to accomplish what I just did in the previous example is this:

aMethod(aString as String, anInteger as Integer = 100) 

Really, the Optional keyword just sets a default value of "0" to the anInteger variable, so the only real difference is that you get to set an arbitrary default value when using the second approach.