Java Tip 11: Use references and save typing time!

With references, you can minimize keystrokes. Here's how

By John D. Mitchell, JavaWorld.com, 06/01/96

Here is a quick and easy hack to reduce the amount of typing involved in writing Java code.

References are a great way to simplify your code. It seems that people just coming to Java get frustrated by various "deficiencies" of the language because all they have really seen of it are the sample programs in a book or two.

It is common in sample code to use the the entire package.class.field naming style to access fields. For primitive types, just copy it to a local variable. For reference fields, why not use a local reference to the class instead? For example, rather than typing this all day long:

// ...
System.out.println (something);
System.out.println (or);
System.out.println (other);
// ...
System.out.println (yet);
System.out.println (still);
System.out.println (more);
System.out.println (stuff);
// ...

Why not just type:

public class SaveTyping
{
    private static final PrintStream o = System.out;
// ...
o.println (something);
o.println (or);
o.println (other);
// ...
o.println (yet);
o.println (still);
o.println (more);
o.println (stuff);
// ...
}

That's all there is to it.

Unfortunately, Java does not currently support method references (that is, "method pointers"), so you cannot shorten that part down any further. Well, OK, you could go totally wild and define your own local class, but that is a wee bit over the top in my book, so it is left as an exercise for the reader.

Author Bio

Subsisting on caffeine, sugar, and too little sleep, John D. Mitchell has been consulting for most of the last nine years, and developed PDA software in OO assembly language at Geoworks. He funds his Java addiction by writing compilers, Tcl/Tk, C++, and Java systems. He co-authored the hot new Java book Making Sense of Java and is currently developing a Java compiler.