Understanding object creation

[Lynne Dixon]

I'm working through Head First Java and trying to wrap my head around the mechanics of object creation. I'm pulling this example from that book, pages 38-39.

The example shows 3 classes:

Player
GuessGame
GameLauncher

Player has an instance variable "number", and a method guess().
GuessGame has instance variables "p1, "p2", and "p3", and a method startGame() that runs the game.
GameLauncher contains the main().

At the start of GuessGame's startGame(), there is this:

public class GuessGame {
    Player p1;
    Player p2;
    Player p3;

    public void startGame() {
        p1 = new Player();
        p2 = new Player();
        p3 = new Player();

My confusion in object creation is the repetition of the name, in this case Player and Player().

Are the "Player p1" and "p1 = new Player()" both referring to Player.class?

Here's another example:

Dog d = new Dog();

I'm confused as to there being a "Dog" type and a "Dog()" method of the same name, doing different things.

Thanks for your help

[Bear Bibeault]

Dog is the class. Dog() is the constructor for that class. Constructors are always named for the classes that they construct.

[Lynne Dixon]

I haven't learned about constructors, yet. Does the JVM create the constructor? Where does it come from?

[Knute Snortum]

If a class has no explicit constructor, then it is assumed that there is a no-argument constructor with an empty body, as if you typed this:

public Dog() {
}

In this case, the class would be Dog. "Dog" would change if the class was named something else. You can read more about it here.

[Winston Gutkowski]

Lynne Dixon wrote:Are the "Player p1" and "p1 = new Player()" both referring to Player.class?

Yes and no.

Once you create a class called Player, the compiler will assume that any time it sees the word 'Player' in open code (ie, not in quotes or in a comment, or as part of some larger word) it means a Player type or object - including inside the Player class itself.

However, what it does with that knowledge depends on the context.

In the case of "Player p1" it is the declaration of a variable (called 'p1') that can hold a reference to a Player object.

In the case of "p1 = new Player()" it is a statement that assigns the reference of a newly-created Player object to p1.

HIH

Winston

[Lynne Dixon]

So in my first example, "Player p1" refers to the class Player. And "p1 = new Player()" refers to the constructor Player. Correct?

[Knute Snortum]

Player p1; defines the variable p1.
p1 = new Player(); assigns the object created with the Player() constructor to p1.

[Winston Gutkowski]

Lynne Dixon wrote:So in my first example, "Player p1" refers to the class Player. And "p1 = new Player()" refers to the constructor Player. Correct?

Basically: Yes.

Winston

[Lynne Dixon]

Awesome. Thanks all

[Winston Gutkowski]

Lynne Dixon wrote:Awesome. Thanks all

You're most welcome.

And welcome to JavaRanch!

Winston