Question

I have a java code similar to this:

AnObject anObject = new AnObject() {
    int count;
    public int creation() {
        return count;
    }
};

I can’t understand the meaning of the braces. A class following the constructor?
Thank you!

Answer 1

It is an anonymous inner class.

Basically, it is a subclass of AnObject without a name.

It’s anonymous because it does not have a class name declaration (e.g. class Foo), and it is an inner class because it is defined within another class (which does not seem to be shown in the code provided.)

javac will usually name these classes with the containing class with a $ and some numeric identifier, such as Foobar$1 — you’ll likely find <EnclosingClass>$1.class after you compile that code.

(Where <EnclosingClass> is the class which contains the anonymous inner class.)