Question

When I use JLabel string comparison with == works fine

private JLabel someJLabel = new JLabel("some text");
...
System.out.println (someJLabel.getText() == "some text"); // returns true

but when I use JTextField

private JTextField someJTextField = new JTextField("some text");
...
System.out.println (someJTextField.getText() == "some text"); // returns false

I know that if I used someJTextField.getText().equals("some text"); it would work fine.

So why it works with JLabel but not JTextField

EDIT: yes I know that I should use .equals with string, I have read this article http://javatechniques.com/blog/string-equality-and-interning/ but it’s known already that I will use “some text” so it could refer to same string object

Answer 1

JTextField internally copies the string to its modifiable document object to support editing so you don’t get back the same string in getText().