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From: Scott Dunning <scottwd01@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.java.programmer
Subject: Help understanding methods
Date: Sun, 27 Jul 2014 17:46:53 -0700
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So, I'm very new to Java, I have a summer college course and we're on 
functions (methods) and I'm having a bit of trouble understanding them.

There is a question on a lab I'm having a little trouble with:

"Write a method called MaxOfThree that accepts three integer parameters 
and returns the largest of the three."

This is what I have so far but I'm not sure whats wrong. I added the 
print statement at the end because I wasn't getting a return value when 
I ran it but now I'm getting errors and it's not compiling. If you could 
help me understand methods a bit more I'd greatly appreciate it. For 
instance how the parameters work and calling it and if what's included 
in the function call is correct and how that works. I just get so 
confused when I read through the material and was hoping for an 
explanation in more layman's terms. Thanks for any help, here is what I 
have so far.

public class Test {

     public static void main(String[] args) {
         int a = 2, b = 3, c = 4;
         int maxValue = max3(a, b, c);
     }

     public static int max3(int a, int b, int c) {
         int max = a;
         if (b > max) max = b;
         if (c > max) max = c;
         return max;
         System.out.println(max);
     }
}


Here are the errors I'm receiving just in case...

Test.java:16: error: unreachable statement
            System.out.println(max);
            ^
Test.java:17: error: missing return statement
         }
         ^
2 errors