A colleague recently asked me how to deep-clone a Map and I realized that I probably have never used the clone() method- which worries me.
What are the most common scenarios you have found where you need to clone an object?
Share
Sign Up to our social questions and Answers Engine to ask questions, answer people’s questions, and connect with other people.
Login to our social questions & Answers Engine to ask questions answer people’s questions & connect with other people.
Lost your password? Please enter your email address. You will receive a link and will create a new password via email.
Please briefly explain why you feel this question should be reported.
Please briefly explain why you feel this answer should be reported.
Please briefly explain why you feel this user should be reported.
A colleague recently asked me how to deep-clone a Map and I realized that I probably have never used the clone() method- which worries me.
What are the most common scenarios you have found where you need to clone an object?
I assume you are referring to
Object.clone()in Java. If yes, be advised thatObject.clone()has some major problems, and its use is discouraged in most cases. Please see Item 11, from ‘Effective Java’ by Joshua Bloch for a complete answer. I believe you can safely useObject.clone()on primitive type arrays, but apart from that you need to be judicious about properly using and overriding clone. You are probably better off defining a copy constructor or a static factory method that explicitly clones the object according to your semantics.