What's the point of Guava's Optional class?
Probably the single biggest disadvantage of null is that it's not obvious what it should mean in any given context: it doesn't have an illustrative name. It's not always obvious that null means "no value for this parameter" -- heck, as a return value, sometimes it means "error", or even "success" (!!), or simply "the correct answer is nothing". Optional is frequently the concept you actually mean when you make a variable nullable, but not always.
more: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9561295/whats-the-point-of-guavas-optional-class
Example in com.sk89q.intake.argument.Namespace
/**
* Returns the value specified by the given key.
*
* @param key The key
* @return The value, which may be null, including when the key doesn't exist
*/
public Optional<Object> get(Object key) {
if (!locals.containsKey(key)) Optional.absent();
return Optional.of(locals.get(key));
}
/**
* Get an object whose key will be the object's class.
*
* @param key The key
* @param <T> The type of object
* @return The value
*/
@SuppressWarnings("unchecked")
public <T> Optional<T> get(Class<T> key) {
if (!locals.containsKey(key)) Optional.absent();
return Optional.of((T)locals.get(key));
}
What's the point of Guava's Optional class?
Probably the single biggest disadvantage of null is that it's not obvious what it should mean in any given context: it doesn't have an illustrative name. It's not always obvious that null means "no value for this parameter" -- heck, as a return value, sometimes it means "error", or even "success" (!!), or simply "the correct answer is nothing". Optional is frequently the concept you actually mean when you make a variable nullable, but not always.
more: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9561295/whats-the-point-of-guavas-optional-class
Optional class: http://docs.guava-libraries.googlecode.com/git/javadoc/com/google/common/base/Optional.html
Example in
com.sk89q.intake.argument.Namespace