Hello @valhalla-dev <[email protected]>, I was just watching the Inside Java Podcast, episode 68, and at 16:35 [1], they start talking about operator overloading, mentioning at 17:53 [2] that String can't be a value class.
I've heard bits and pieces of the why behind this claim, here and there, something to do with hashCode. So, I looked at the source code for String [3]. I see 2 mutable fields -- private int hash [4] and private boolean hashIsZero [5]. But assuming that JEP 531: Lazy Constants (Third Preview) [6] goes live, that should allow these 2 to be final fields. I know there are other things required to be a value class, but I don't see where String would fail those pre-requisites. But let me first ask -- Is it true that String can't become a value class? And if so, why not? Thank you for your time. David Alayachew [1] = https://youtu.be/qGRAWfLLJFQ?si=vRZ_I_2BzRT0jh0D&t=995 [2] = https://youtu.be/qGRAWfLLJFQ?si=2PrN0Af_vys1Jtif&t=1073 [3] = https://github.com/openjdk/jdk/blob/5962d86603a98a0f83aad6fcd6e9dcf90182504e/src/java.base/share/classes/java/lang/String.java [4] = https://github.com/openjdk/jdk/blob/5962d86603a98a0f83aad6fcd6e9dcf90182504e/src/java.base/share/classes/java/lang/String.java#L206 [5] = https://github.com/openjdk/jdk/blob/5962d86603a98a0f83aad6fcd6e9dcf90182504e/src/java.base/share/classes/java/lang/String.java#L214 [6] = https://openjdk.org/jeps/531
