Yes, exactly, all of this. I remember learning Java when I was beginning programming and told that it was "pass by reference except for primitive types which a

Yes, exactly, all of this. I remember learning Java when I was beginning programming and told that it was "pass by reference except for primitive types which are copied", when that's a total lie! It's not pass by reference at all. I think they said this because C++ copies objects (or nowadays, moves them) when you pass them as arguments (unless you pass by ref), and they wanted to make the distinction with C++ (i.e. "Java doesn't copy objects when you pass them to functions"). But it's done a terrible disservice to the entire industry confusing programmers for years by using the term "pass-by-reference", which has an entirely different meaning. What people mean when they say "Java is pass-by-reference" is that "if you pass a mutable object to a function, the function can mutate it". But that's not the same thing at all.