Inner class... how and why ?

[Pascal Got]

Hi,
I have some questions, not on syntax but more on 'how and why' ?
- Why would one want to instanciate an inner class before instanciating the outer class ?

- When instanciating an outer class, is the inner being instanciated as well (automatically) If 'yes' why does the language enbales instanciation of an inner independently of it outer class ?
Please give me some example (short)...
Thx
Pascal

[zarina mohammad]

check out the campfire story about Inner class. http://www.javaranch.com/campfire.jsp
Easier way to understand about Inner classes.
-zarina

[Corey McGlone]

You can't instantiate an inner class prior to instantiating the enclosing class. All inner classes must have an enclosing instance in order to exist. The inverse is not true. You do not need to instantiate an inner class to instantiate an outer class. By that, I mean that, if an outer class has a reference to an inner class, that reference can remain null after the outer class is instantiated.
You can, however, create an instance of a top-level nested class (which is like an inner class, but it is static, so it's not truly an inner class) without an instance of the enclosing class.
I hope that helps,
Corey