Andrei Alexandrescu: > I did some more research and found a study: > http://users.encs.concordia.ca/~chalin/papers/TR-2006-003.v3s-pub.pdf > ... > Turns out in 2/3 of cases, references are really meant to be non-null... > not really a landslide but a comfortable majority.
Thank you for bringing real data to this debate. Note that 2/3 is relative to nonlocal variables only: >In Java programs, at least 2/3 of declarations (other than local variables) >that are of reference types are meant to be non-null, based on design intent. We exclude local variables because their non-nullity can be inferred by intra-procedural analysis< So the total percentage may be different (higher?). Anyway, nonnullable by default seems the way to go if such feature is added. Bye, bearophile
