Question

While searching for a way to define static constructors, I’ve stumbled upon the use of the following:

class MyClass {
    { /* code for constructor-like (?) effect */ }
}

Basically the code that is entered in curly brackets directly in the class works, as far as I can see, exactly the same as a code in a constructor – except that it is called before the constructor.

What is the purpose of this, and are there other differences between this and a standard constructor?

Thanks in advance,

Answer 1

The block with the curly brackets is an instance initializer block. This page from Oracle’s Java Tutorials has some more info about it.

Also see: How is an instance initializer different from a constructor?