create a new Integer object that holds the value 1?
You skipped the intended solution:
Integer p = Integer.valueOf(1);
This pattern is known as Factory method pattern. One may ask what the benefit of this method is. Luckily, the implementation of class Integer
is open-source, so let's take a look:
public static Integer valueOf(int i) {
if (i >= IntegerCache.low && i <= IntegerCache.high)
return IntegerCache.cache[i + (-IntegerCache.low)];
return new Integer(i);
}
There seems to be some kind of Integer
-value cache. If one requests an Integer
with a value within the cache-range, Java does not create a new object, but returns a previously created one. This works because Integer
s are immutable. One can even control the upper cache limit with the system property java.lang.Integer.IntegerCache.high=...
.
And why do the other two methods of creating an Integer
generate a warning? Because they were set deprecated with Java 9.
Integer#Integer(int value)
:
Deprecated. It is rarely appropriate to use this constructor. The static factory
valueOf(int)
is generally a better choice, as it is likely to yield significantly better space and time performance. [...]
Integer#Integer(String s)
:
Deprecated. It is rarely appropriate to use this constructor. Use
parseInt(String)
to convert a string to aint
primitive, or usevalueOf(String)
to convert a string to anInteger
object. [...]
And just for completeness, here is the part for Integer.valueOf(int i)
:
Returns an
Integer
instance representing the specifiedint
value. If a newInteger
instance is not required, this method should generally be used in preference to the constructorInteger(int)
, as this method is likely to yield significantly better space and time performance by caching frequently requested values. This method will always cache values in the range-128
to127
, inclusive, and may cache other values outside of this range.
EDIT 1: Thanks to @VGR mentioning that
Integer p = 1;
is equivilant to
Integer p = Integer.valueOf(1);
This, however, is only true for int
-values between -128
and 127
. The behaviour is defined in JLS §5.1.7:
[...] If the value
p
being boxed is the result of evaluating a constant expression (§15.28) of typeboolean
,char
,short
,int
, orlong
, and the result istrue
,false
, a character in the range'\u0000'
to'\u007f'
inclusive, or an integer in the range-128
to127
inclusive, then leta
andb
be the results of any two boxing conversions ofp
. It is always the case thata == b
.
EDIT 2: Thanks to @DorianGray, who brought the following to my attention.
While not in the JLS, the version of javac
I am using (9.0.4
) does compile the boxing down to Integer.valueOf(...);
as it is shown in this answer by Adam Rosenfield.
Method 4, Integer p = Integer.valueOf(1);
is the recommended way. The JavaDoc says:
Returns an Integer instance representing the specified int value. If a new Integer instance is not required, this method should generally be used in preference to the constructor Integer(int), as this method is likely to yield significantly better space and time performance by caching frequently requested values. This method will always cache values in the range -128 to 127, inclusive, and may cache other values outside of this range.