strings and string pool

[Vinney Shanmugam]

what is the difference between declaring,

String test = "string testing";

and

String test = new String("string testing");

[Devaka Cooray]

You have mentioned the difference in the subject line.
In other words, the second statement always create a NEW String object, while the first statement may take an existing String object from the String pool.

[Rob Spoor]

Even worse, the second line does both. It takes a string out of the string pool (creating it if necessary) and then creates an exact copy of it. The String API also mentions this:

Initializes a newly created String object so that it represents the same sequence of characters as the argument; in other words, the newly created string is a copy of the argument string. Unless an explicit copy of original is needed, use of this constructor is unnecessary since Strings are immutable.

[Campbell Ritchie]

Rob Prime wrote: . . . The String API also mentions this . . .

Vinney Shanmugam, you should by now be used to looking in the API documentation. And noticing where the documentation tells you not to use a construct.