On 12/11/2011 10:14 PM, Alan Bateman wrote:
On 11/11/2011 19:37, Darryl Mocek wrote:
Returning null if the value is not a String gives the impression that
there was no property with that key when the property may have been
there and may in fact have been removed.
That's a fair point and probably enough to conclude that this approach
should be dismissed.
The toString approach is inconsistent so I think this brings us back to
the original suggestion which is to specify that CCE is thrown (as it
always has) but without side effects (meaning it doesn't remove the
property). I think this is the best we can do with this broken API.
I tend to agree. If the value is not a string then leave it alone and
throw CCE.
David
-----
:
I would prefer it if Properties didn't allow non-String keys and
values at all since they're supposed to be Strings (by API
implication) and that Properties not extend Hashtable or extends
Hashtable<String, String>, but I digress.
Properties goes back to JDK1.0 and has a warning in its javadoc for many
years to discourage inserting keys or values that are not Strings. I'm
not sure whether we can do much about it now without risking
compatibility issues.
-Alan.
