There's two 'identifiers'. $scramble and $scramblex Synax: $scramble(word) $scramblex(word) What $scramble does is rearranges the characters place in the identifer, and it can get the string you are trying to scramble. (eg: $scramble(blah) could return a lot of things including "blah.") Where as $scramblex will not return what you are trying to scramble.