Discussion on: I'm Wes Bos, Ask Me Anything!

[Wes Bos]

By far is how values get passed into functions.

const firstName = 'Wes';

function sayHello(name) {
  console.log(`Hello ${name}`);
}

sayHello(firstName);

Why is it name and not firstName?!

Seems to simple to anyone programming for a while, but it's often a cause for confusion in my students.

References (arrays, objects) VS values (strings, numbers) is another one.

Truthy/falsy was another one but I've got pretty good at explaining that :)

[Will]

Beginner here, is this because whatever you put in the brackets after sayHello is what is passed, 'name' is essentially a placeholder for the value you are passing into it?

[Kelly Andrews]

Correct. name is the parameter scoped to that function.

[Kelly Andrews]

That's really good info. I never would have guessed that. Thanks for answering!

[Ben Halpern]

This brings me back. I remember this tripping me up early on. It lead to some behavior like always using the same name for both things just in case.