Java 7 - New and Noteworthy

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Why bother?

1. Java 6 is outdated and will not be updated anymore. Using it is a security risk.
2. Java 7 offers some great new features.

New and Noteworthy Features in Java 7

In this section MatthesRieke and DanielNuest quickly mention some features that shold become part of our daily software development because the considerably improve the code. More information can be found in the links at the bottom.

java.nio

Use it instead of java.io - much easier to use and very useful (convenience) functionality for file and folder watching, file copying.

Base class to start with: Paths.java and it's static methods.

More info:

• http://jaxenter.de/artikel/javaniofile-Zeitgemaesses-Arbeiten-mit-Dateien-166848
• http://openbook.galileocomputing.de/java7/1507_05_003.html#dodtp5dfa2002-a33e-4111-bf56-d8b6f892e45d

String switch statements

The same as int or enum switches, use it instead of if-else chains.

try-with-resource

Java 7 can take care to "finally" close streams (interface AutoCloseable) instead of manually haven if!=null and try with in a finally statement...

I could be harder to get the actual exception.

Multicatch

Make catch statements a lot easier to read and limit duplication of code and you are not tempted to capture the generic Exception.

Fork and join

... vll. Zur XML Erzeugung? Tasks mit xmlbeans, joins in stax...

If you have a task you can divide and conquer you can use the fork/join framework to manage this task in many threads.

See http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/essential/concurrency/forkjoin.html

Diamond Operator

Makes instantiations short and readable (can even be warned about by the compiler): Write

Map<String, List<Trade>> trades = new TreeMap <> ();

instead of

Map<String, List<Trade>> trades = new TreeMap <String, List<Trade>> ();.

More Resources and Documentation

• Java ist eine Insel - Was ist neu in Java 7? > http://openbook.galileocomputing.de/java7/1507_01_001.html#dodtpda76ad0b-c0d0-464a-b6ae-d5541529a9c8
• New in Java 7 - Orreilly Radar > http://radar.oreilly.com/2011/09/java7-features.html
• Eclipse "What's new for Java 7?" shows the integration of new features into the Eclipse IDE > http://www.eclipse.org/jdt/ui/r3_8/Java7news/whats-new-java-7.html
• Oracle - Java SE 7 Features and Enhancements > http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/jdk7-relnotes-418459.html
• Artikelreihe bei Heise Devloper > http://www.heise.de/developer/artikel/Was-ist-neu-in-Java-7-Teil-1-Produktivitaet-1274360.html