The other part of this problem is that you are using the + (binary addition). In the
JLS section 15.7.2 it says that all operands wil be fully evaluated before the operation is carried out, and further more that operands are evaluated left to right.
In your first example 'i++ + --i', if i = 1:
the i++ is evaluated first, for this expression it evaluates to 1 because it is a post fix operator. The value of 2 is stored into the i variable and the orginal value of i is used in the binary addition. Then the right hand operand is evaluated, the --i, this finds the value of 2 in the variable i, it decrements it to a 1 then it performs the binary addition by adding 1 + 1.
In the second example, --i + i++, if i = 1:
the first thing that happens is the --i is evaluated and the variable i is changed, in this case to 0, then the i++ is evaluated and the result is stored in i while the original value of i is used in the expression. So the expression becomes 0 + 0.
hope this helps