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For function that manipulate strings, modern object-oriented languages, like C# and Java have immutable strings and return a copy (in newly allocated dynamic memory), while others, like C manipulate the original string unless the programmer copies data to a new string.
For object values, the reference cannot change. This allows the Java compiler to "capture" the value of the variable at run-time and store a copy as a field in the inner class. Once the outer method has terminated and its stack frame has been removed, the original variable is gone but the inner class's private copy persists in the class's own ...
clone() is a method in the Java programming language for object duplication. In Java, objects are manipulated through reference variables, and there is no operator for copying an object—the assignment operator duplicates the reference, not the object. The clone() method provides this missing functionality.
By returning a null object (i.e., an empty list) instead, there is no need to verify that the return value is in fact a list. The calling function may simply iterate the list as normal, effectively doing nothing. It is, however, still possible to check whether the return value is a null object (an empty list) and react differently if desired.
This is a list of the instructions that make up the Java bytecode, an abstract machine language that is ultimately executed by the Java virtual machine. [1] The Java bytecode is generated from languages running on the Java Platform, most notably the Java programming language.
For an object, semantics can confuse programmers since an object is always treated as a reference. Passing an object ByVal copies the reference; not the state of the object. The called procedure can modify the state of the object via its methods yet cannot modify the object reference of the actual parameter.
In computer programming, the return type (or result type) defines and constrains the data type of the value returned from a subroutine or method. [1] In many programming languages (especially statically-typed programming languages such as C, C++, Java) the return type must be explicitly specified when declaring a function.
Thus, often the only way to use the clone() method is if the class of an object is known, which is contrary to the abstraction principle of using the most generic type possible. For example, if one has a List reference in Java, one cannot invoke clone() on that reference because List specifies no public clone() method.