Question

I am currently trying to figure out how to use Eclipse to program Escape models in java. I am quite new to Escape and Eclipse, and it has been a while since I programmed in java, so please excuse if this is a stupid question.

Basically, I have been haunted by strange Eclipse error messages. I tracked the last one down to this problem:

This works:

public class CoordinationGame extends Scape {

.
    .
    .
    Scape lattice;

boolean test;
int test2;

{
test = true;
test2 = 3;
}

{
lattice = new Scape(new Array2DVonNeumann());
}

}

This gives strange error messages:

public class CoordinationGame extends Scape {

    .
.
.

Scape lattice;

boolean test;
int test2;

test = true;
test2 = 3;

lattice = new Scape(new Array2DVonNeumann());
}

i.e. { expected afer int test2 and Syntax error on token "lattice", VariableDeclaratorId expected after this token.

As I said, Java has been some time, but IIRC, those brackets should not be required. This question establishes that this bracket usage is an initializing block, but this is probably not what I want to do here.

Does anyone know why Eclipse requires me to set these brackets, or what I could do to change this behaviour?

Thanks in advance!
Martin

PS: Some information that will probably be useful:

I use eclipse-indigo, installed the modelling toolkit AMP. I am not entirely sure how to check this, but I believe I am using jre6, as this is what it says in the JRE System Library tab of my package explorer. In the future, I plan to find a way to run the Escape modelling environment with Groovy, but that will be another question …

Answer 1

This has nothing to do with your IDE. Java does not allow statements at class level, it does however allow initializers at class level.

{foo();}

This is an instance initializer, it will be copied into all constructors by the compiler.
(See Java Tutorial > Initializing Fields)

In Java, you can write statements in

• a method
• a constructor (which is a special kind of method)
• an initializer block (static or instance)

but nowhere else.