VB.NET, Is Object Returned by Reference from Function

Question

This should be a fairly common question, but I haven\'t found a straightforward answer anywhere.

If I instantiate an object within a function in VB.NET and return it

Answer 1

VB.NET does not have the ability to return by reference. Neither does C# for that matter, but it has been proposed. What you actually get back is just a reference to the object. So to precisely define this it returns a reference to the object. It does not return by reference like what you might compare to the ByRef keyword.