Mastering switch statements and expressions
Complicated if statements, with many else if branches and an else branch can be verbose. The switch structure can, in many situations, be more concise and elegant. Let us start with switch statements.
switch statements
Firstly, let us examine the syntax of the switch statement. Figure 4.8 introduces the syntax.
Figure 4.8 – The switch statement syntax
A switch statement evaluates an expression. As of Java 21, the expression can be an integral primitive (excluding long) or any reference type. This means that we can switch on primitive variables of type byte, char, short, or int and also switch on class types, enum types, record types and array types. The case labels can now include a null label. Java 21 also brought in pattern matching for switch. We will present another switch example demonstrating this feature when we have those topics covered (Chapter 9). Until then, we will focus on the more traditional...
