Thank you for all of your comments. With third-party apps, you usually don't have a choice about whether or not stored procs are used. My real intention for the article wasn't really to start a discussion about the pros and cons of their use, just to show how to use them. Anyway, my opinion is probably pretty obvious from the article.

Several of you made a good point about the return value. I was just really trying to show how to use it, but looking back I see that my example was poor. I'm not sure if it is possible to edit an article after it has been already posted. I'll shoot Steve an email about it and see what he says.

Thanks again for reading the article and your constructive comments. I just started writing this past winter and know I have a lot to learn!

Kathi