Question

I am looking at the SNMPBEECodec which can be seen at this location
In particular I am looking at the function encodeLength()
A snippet I am interested in

        int numBytes = 0;
        int temp = length;
        while (temp > 0)
        {
            ++numBytes;
            temp = (int)Math.floor(temp / 256);
        }   

(from the Drexel SNMP library).

I would like to know why Math.floor() is used instead of just a simple integer division like temp/256. It seems the simple integer division would give the same result. Or is there a technical difference?

Answer 1

To answer the technical part of your question:

Using math.floor() is superfluous: temp / 256 is an integer (by Java’s rules for integer arithmetic), and using Math.floor() on an integer is pointless. You could simply use temp / 256.

Why the author did this is impossible to answer without reading their mind. The author might simply have been confused about the behaviour of division in Java, and decided to “play it safe” – but that is just speculation.