Question

First, here is my code :

public static boolean loginValide(final String username, final String password) throws IOException {
    final boolean valide = false;
    final String postData = "somePostParameters";
    URL url;
    HttpsURLConnection connexion;

    url = new URL("someUrl");
    connexion = (HttpsURLConnection) url.openConnection();
    try {
        connexion.setDoOutput(true);

        final DataOutputStream dos = new DataOutputStream(connexion.getOutputStream());
        dos.writeBytes(postData);
        dos.flush();
        dos.close();

        final int responseCode = connexion.getResponseCode();
        if (responseCode == HttpURLConnection.HTTP_ACCEPTED) {
            // ...
        }
        else {
            // ...
        }
    } catch (final IOException e) {
        throw new IOException(e); /* I am retrowing an exception so the
        finally block is still called */
    }
    finally {
        connexion.disconnect(); // Close the connection
    }

    return valide;
}

My problem is that I was first only declaring my method throwing an IOException. But if it happens, I suppose the HttpsUrlConnection would not be disconnected.
So I thought catching the Exception, rethrowing it so when my method is called by another class I can handle a network/connection error and tell the user about it, and so the code will still run the finally block to close the connection.

First, am I right? Or is there another way to do this?
I don’t care about the try{} catch{} inside the method, I just want to be sure that the connection and streams will always be closed, whether an exception is thrown or not.

The other problem is the catch{} block where I throw the exception. Eclipse tells me:

Call requires API level 9 (current min is 8): new java.io.IOException

Seriously, I can’t throw an exception using an API level below 9? I hope it’s a joke…

Answer 1

Code in a finally block will always be called, even if the code in the try-block throws an exception. As for the API level restriction – it’s the specific IOException(Throwable) constructor that was added in API level 9.