Object Created inside switch

[Dan Dowe]

Hi Code Ranch peeps;

I'm very new to Java and this is my very first post within the coderanch and was wondering if any of you could assist me with the issue I'm encountering,

To explain my issue I have create as short example which contains two classes Cat and Dog followed by a switch statement in the main method.

Class Cat

public class Cat {
     private String name;
     //Setter
     public void setName(String pName)
     {name = pName;}
     //Getter
     public String getName()
     {return name;}
     // Constructor
     public Cat(String catName)
     {name = catName;}   
}

Class Dog

public class Dog {
    
     private String name;
     //Setter
     public void setName(String pName)
     {name = pName;}
     //Getter
     public String getName()
     {return name;}
     // Constructor
     public Dog(String dogName)
     {name = dogName;}
}

Main Method

 public static void main(String[] args) {
        Scanner scr = new Scanner(System.in); // Import Scanner
        Scanner keyboard = new Scanner(System.in); // Import Scanner

        System.out.println("Please Select a character: \n"
                + "1. Dog\n"
                + "2. Cat \n");

        // setting charopt to store variable of user selection
        int charopt = scr.nextInt();
        //creating switch statment for the user input which was stored in charopt
        switch (charopt) {//open switch
            case 1: {//start Case 1 of Character Selection Menu

                System.out.print("Please enter your Dogs Name: "); //asking for user to enter Name 
                String dogName = keyboard.nextLine(); //Assign variable
                Dog D1 = new Dog(dogName);// creating dog using userinput
                 
                break;
            }
            case 2 : {
                System.out.print("Please enter your Cats Name: "); //asking for user to enter Name 
                String catName = keyboard.nextLine(); //Assign variable
                Cat C1 = new Cat(catName);// creating Cat using userinput 
                break;
            }
            default: System.out.println("Invalid Option ");
        }//close switch
      
         System.out.print(D1.getName()); 
     
}

My Issue is that after creating the objects within the switch statement, I am not able to access them within my main method - is there a way to return the objects back to the main method once created within the switch ? or am I going about this to wrong way ?

would really appreciate some help

[fred rosenberger]

you need to declare the reference outside the switch so it doesn't fall out of scope.

you probably want both Dog and Cat to extend Animal or Pet or Mammal or something...so you'd then do this:

Pet myPet;

switch(charopt){
  case 1:
    //other code
    myPet = new Dog(dogName);
}
...etc...

[Dan Dowe]

Brilliant, thank you for your time