Microsoft® Visual Basic® Scripting Edition Private Statement | Language Reference Version 2

See Also

##### Description

> Used at script level to declare private variables and allocate storage space.

##### Syntax

> Private varname[([subscripts])][, varname[([subscripts])]] . . .

> The Private statement syntax has these parts:

> Part | Description
> varname | Name of the variable; follows standard variable naming conventions.
> subscripts | Dimensions of an array variable; up to 60 multiple dimensions may be declared. The subscripts argument uses the following syntax: upper [, upper] . . . The lower bound of an array is always zero.

##### Remarks

> Private variables are available only to the script in which they are declared.

> A variable that refers to an object must be assigned an existing object using the Set statement before it can be used. Until it is assigned an object, the declared object variable has the special value Nothing.

> You can also use the Private statement with empty parentheses to declare a dynamic array. After declaring a dynamic array, use the ReDim statement within a procedure to define the number of dimensions and elements in the array. If you try to redeclare a dimension for an array variable whose size was explicitly specified in a Private, Public, or Dim statement, an error occurs.

> When variables are initialized, a numeric variable is initialized to 0 and a string is initialized to a zero-length string ("").

> Tip When you use the Private statement in a procedure, you generally put the Private statement at the beginning of the procedure.

> The following example illustrates use of the Private statement:

> >     Private MyNumber     ' Private Variant variable.
> >     Private MyArray(9)   'Private array variable.
> >     ' Multiple Private declarations of Variant variables.
> >     Private MyNumber, MyVar, YourNumber

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