Compile time error while accessing public variable in java main method - java

Can some one help what is wrong in this code? I have a parent class and child class created in java. I created a Parent class instance in Child class static main method. The public method is accessible, but not the public variable. Initially I thought this is something related to static scope. But that does not seem to be the issue. Because I am explicitly creating an instance of Parent class in the main method of child class. So ideally both variable and method should be accessible as I am explicitly creating an instance of Parent class in the static context. Strange thing is method is accessible without errors, but not the variable. Why the compiler is OK with the method but not with the variable? Ideally the error should be shown for both or not at all.
Both classes are in different package. But public scope is not going to be a problem even if the classes are in different packages I hope. Please find the below two classes..
package com.learning.scjp.examples;
public class ParentClass {
public String parentClassPublicVariable = "parentClassPublicVariable";
public void parentClassPublicScopeMethod(){
System.out.println("parentClassPublicScopeMethod");
}
}
=================================================================
package learning.access.classes;
import com.learning.scjp.examples.ParentClass;
public class ChildClass extends ParentClass {
public static void main(String[] args) {
ParentClass parentClass = new ParentClass();
parentClass.parentClassPublicVariable;//This statement shows compile time error "not a statement"
parentClass.parentClassPublicScopeMethod();
}
}

In general a statement in java is something that contains enough information to compile to translate the code into a meaninful action, something that can be executed by JVM.
Usually it can be:
Declaration statement (Example: int i = 0;)
Expression statement (Example: i++)
Control flow statement (Example: for(int i = 0; i < 10;i++))
The line:
parentClass.parentClassPublicVariable
is basically meaningless, it has no action, therefor compiler doesn't understand what should be done, its an error from the compiler's standpoint. Hence you have "not a statement" compilation error.
You can read about the statements here

You are able to access it just do it this way :-
class ParentClass {
public String parentClassPublicVariable = "parentClassPublicVariable";
public void parentClassPublicScopeMethod(){
System.out.println("parentClassPublicScopeMethod");
}
}
public class Try extends ParentClass {
public static void main(String[] args) {
ParentClass parentClass = new ParentClass();
System.out.println(parentClass.parentClassPublicVariable); // You can print it.
parentClass.parentClassPublicVariable = "StackOverflow"; // You can even reassign variable.
System.out.println(parentClass.parentClassPublicVariable);
parentClass.parentClassPublicScopeMethod();
}
}
Basically the line parentClass.parentClassPublicVariable; itself is useless and compiler is not able to understand it hence the error it had nothing to do with access modifiers or inheritance as you assumed.

Related

How can i access one class variable into other

There are to separate classes class One and class Two. Both of classes are in same package. I want to access one class data into other class how can i access variable data. My program is very lengthy ,I just want the logic of this.Thanking you in advance.
Class A.java
public class A
{
public static void main(String ar[])
{
int a=100;
}
}
Class B.java
public class B extends A
{
public static void main(String m[])
{
A obj=new A();
System.out.println("Variable of class A is :"+ obj.a);
}
}
I have done this thing to get access like i declared variable a as Static so that i can directly get access but it's not working. and when i am compiling B.java It giving me error
cannot find symbol at := System.out.println("Variable of class A is :"+ obj.a);
And
Illegal start of expression (when i am delaring variable a as public)
:-(error)public int a=100; [in class A].
Why are you using the static main method? Besides that the field a is local and not accessible outside the scope. Use this instead.
public class A
{
public int a;
public A()
{
a=100;
}
}
You don't have two true object-oriented classes above, but rather little more than two receptacles for static main methods. To combine code from two classes well, you will want to scrap that code and make OOP-compliant classes, complete with instance fields and methods. For more on this, check out the OOP section of the Java tutorials: link to OOP tutorial.
First, get rid of main() in A. You only want one main() in your application, and it's in B (since the one in A doesn't actually do anything):
public class A {
}
Now, you want A to have a class-level int value:
public class A {
private int a;
}
And you want it to have a default value of 100, yes? A constructor is a good place to do that:
public class A {
private int a;
public A() {
this.a = 100;
}
}
Now any time you do this:
A obj = new A();
you will have an object with a value. In order to access that value from outside that object, you need a "getter":
public class A {
private int a;
public A() {
this.a = 100;
}
public int get_a() {
return this.a;
}
}
Now in B (or anywhere, really), you can create an instance of A and access that value by using the "getter":
A obj=new A();
System.out.println("Variable of class A is :"+ obj.get_a());
Semantically, don't think of it as "accessing a variable from another class". Instead, think of what your objects are and what they represent. If it were a physical, real-world object which internally contained some kind of value.
When you create an instance of that object, the instance would internally have that value somewhere. From the outside of that object, it doesn't really matter how that value is internally maintained. There just needs to be some kind of interface to see the value. Which is what the "getter" method does.
One-liner answer: To access a variable outside a class, make it class-level. You have written a method-level variable that's accessible only inside that scope (method).
To elaborate:
There are to separate classes class One and class Two. Both of classes are in same package. I want to access one class data into other class how can i access variable data.
So basically you know that to by extending, you should be able to access parent class data into your subclass. For that, simply make the data in your parent class as class level.
class A {
int var = 10; //class level, but non-static, so to access you need A object
void method() {
int var = 20; //this is method local and can not be accessed outside
}
}
public class B extends A {
public static void main(String[] args) {
A aObj = new A();
System.out.println(aObj.var);
}
}
Illegal start of expression (when i am delaring variable a as public)
Its illegal. Because access modifiers like public, private etc. are applicable to class-level stuff like the first var or the main method in class B you see.
Said that:
You need to immediately go here: https://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/
rather than just trying to run some classes when you lack language basics.

Generic way of referencing parent class in Java

I have some code that I need to reuse in several Java apps. That code implements a GUI which in turn needs to access some static variables and methods from the calling class. Those variables and methods are always called the same in all of the apps. Is there a generic way to obtain a handle to the calling class in Java so the code for "someGUI" class can remain untouched and in fact come from the same source file for all the different apps?
Minimal working example:
import javax.swing.*;
class test {
static int variable = 123;
public static void main(String[] args) {
someGUI sg = new someGUI();
sg.setVisible(true);
}
}
class someGUI extends JFrame {
public someGUI() {
System.out.println(String.format("test.variable = %d", test.variable));
}
}
How can I "generify" the reference to "test" in test.variable to always just refer to the calling class? It's not the "super" class, at least using super.variable doesn't work.
Firstly I would advise against this approach since there are only brittle ways to implement it. You should parameterize SomeGUI with a parameter containing the values you need instead.
However, it is possible to do what you ask by examining the thread's stack trace and using reflection to access the static fields by name. For example like this:
class Test {
static int variable = 123;
public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
SomeGUI sg = new SomeGUI();
}
static class SomeGUI extends JFrame {
public SomeGUI() throws Exception {
StackTraceElement[] stackTrace = Thread.currentThread().getStackTrace();
// stackTrace[0] is getStackTrace(), stackTrace[1] is SomeGUI(),
// stackTrace[2] is the point where our object is constructed.
StackTraceElement callingStackTraceElement = stackTrace[2];
String className = callingStackTraceElement.getClassName();
Class<?> c = Class.forName(className);
Field declaredField = c.getDeclaredField("variable");
Object value = declaredField.get(null);
System.out.println(String.format("test.variable = %d", value));
}
}
}
This will print test.variable = 123.
Obviously this is sensitive to renaming of the variables. It is also sensitive to dynamic proxies.
Also, it should be noted that you need to do this in the constructor. If you try to do this kind of lookup in other methods you can not find out how the instance was created.
There is no inheritance between somGUI and test,
Actual inheritance is there between someGUI and JFrame.
If you use super(), JVM tries to find 'variable' in JFrame, that is not what you wanted.
Use static methods setters & getters to access the 'variable' instead of direct accessing them.

Why isn't the Java compiler (specifically its parser) able to understand this statement

I have the following two classes (in two separate files).
public class Foo
{
public static class A
{
public static final boolean FLAG = false;
}
public final A A = new A();
}
public class Bar
{
void method()
{
if (Foo.A.FLAG) <<<< this is giving "Cannot make static ref to non-static field
// do something
;
}
}
My question is, why isn't the compiler able to recorgnise that by Foo.A, I meant the class A, not the member, which also happens to be named A?
This is called obscuring, an obscure feature/limitation of Java
A simple name may occur in contexts where it may potentially be
interpreted as the name of a variable, a type, or a package. In these
situations, the rules of ยง6.5 specify that a variable will be chosen
in preference to a type, and that a type will be chosen in preference
to a package. Thus, it is may sometimes be impossible to refer to a
visible type or package declaration via its simple name. We say that
such a declaration is obscured.
If the variable A was static, it would compile since you can can access static members on object references.
Also FLAG hasn't been initialized.
Some ways to access the flag:
<Foo_A extends Foo.A> void test1()
{
if(Foo_A.FLAG)
;
}
void test2()
{
class Foo_A extends Foo.A{}
if(Foo_A.FLAG)
;
}
-------------------------------------
import pkg.Foo.A;
public class Bar
{
void test3()
{
if(A.FLAG)
;
}
}
in these contexts, "Foo.A" can only be interpreted as a type, not a variable.
Because inner classes require an instance of the enclosing type. If you dont have an instance of Foo, A doesnt exist.
Edit - This is incorrect, but the reason why is informative. see the comments below:

Java Inner class shadowing external class

I took the following code from the K&B book "SCJP Sun Certified Programmer for Java 6 Study Guide":
class A { // 1
void m() {
System.out.println("outer");
}
}
public class TestInners {
public static void main(String[] args) {
new TestInners().go();
}
void go() {
new A().m();
class A { // 2
void m() {
System.out.println("inner");
}
}
}
class A { // 3
void m() {
System.out.println("middle");
}
}
}
As stated in the book, this code prints "middle". I infer that the class declaration marked as "3" is shadowing the one marked as "1", which is external to TestInners class.
If the classes were in different packages, I could resolve the ambiguity by qualifying one of them with the package name. But in this case the classes are not only in the same package but in the same file. How can I get an instance of the external class?
I saw the same question here but the accepted answer implies to modify the code adding an enclosing class to the whole thing. My question is how to get the instance using any type of qualifier or reference, if it's even possible.
Assuming your class is in package com.test, all you need to do is use
new com.test.A().m();
using the fully qualified name of the class.
If your classes are in the default package, ie. no package declaration, then you are out of luck and can't access the outer A.
In C++, you can explicitly address global scope by prefixing your symbol with ::, however, Java does not have such a thing.
So if you really want to get the outer A, you have to bite the bullet and do some other sort of enclosure, by for example wrapping it in another class or package.
EDIT: Here is another reason why.
object of innner-A can't be created before defining it.so use new A().m(); after define innner-A inside go() to access inner class object.
void go() {
class A {
void m() {
System.out.println("inner");
}
}
new A().m();
}
to access outer-A you have to append package name,in default package it is impossible to access outer-A.

Can't access public non-static class attribute from secondary class

I have the following two classes:
public class Class1
{
public Class1 randomvariable; // Variable declared
public static void main(String[] args)
{
randomvariable = new Class1(); // Variable initialized
}
}
public class Class2
{
public static void ranMethod()
{
randomvariable.getSomething(); // I can't access the member "randomvariable" here even though it's public and it's in the same project?
}
}
I am very certain that it's a very fundamental thing I'm missing here, but what am I actually missing? The Class1 member "randomvariable" is public and so is the class and both classes are in the same project.
What do I have to do to fix this problem?
There are two problems:
Firstly, you're trying to assign a value to randomvariable from main, without there being an instance of Class1. This would be okay in an instance method, as randomvariable would be implicitly this.randomvariable - but this is a static method.
Secondly, you're trying to read the value from Class2.ranMethod, again without there being an instance of Class1 involved.
It's important that you understand what an instance variable is. It's a value associated with a particular instance of a class. So if you had a class called Person, you might have a variable called name. Now in Class2.ranMethod, you'd effectively be writing:
name.getSomething();
That makes no sense - firstly there's nothing associating this code with Person at all, and secondly it doesn't say which person is involved.
Likewise within the main method - there's no instance, so you haven't got the context.
Here's an alternative program which does work, so you can see the difference:
public class Person {
// In real code you should almost *never* have public variables
// like this. It would normally be private, and you'd expose
// a public getName() method. It might be final, too, with the value
// assigned in the constructor.
public String name;
public static void main(String[] args) {
Person x = new Person();
x.name = "Fred";
PersonPresenter.displayPerson(x);
}
}
class PersonPresenter {
// In a real system this would probably be an instance method
public static void displayPerson(Person person) {
System.out.println("I present to you: " + person.name);
}
}
As you can tell by the comments, this still isn't ideal code - but I wanted to stay fairly close to your original code.
However, this now works: main is trying to set the value of an instance variable for a particular instance, and likewise presentPerson is given a reference to an instance as a parameter, so it can find out the value of the name variable for that instance.
When you try to access randomvariable you have to specify where it lives. Since its a non-static class field, you need an instance of Class1 in order to have a randomvariable. For instance:
Class1 randomclass;
randomclass.randomvariable.getSomething();
If it were a static field instead, meaning that only one exists per class instead of one per instance, you could access it with the class name:
Class1.randomvariable.getSomething();

Categories