Java Strings Interview Questions

The following are some questions you might encounter with respect to Strings in any Java Interview. Strings are very powerful and frankly speaking, there can be no Java based application that does not use Strings. 

Apart from the questions below, there are a few articles that I have put up (as part of the SCJP Certification series) on Strings that you might find useful. You can use them to revise/review your understanding of Strings. 

They are: 

Java String Class

StringBuffer & StringBuilder

Questions: 

1. What would you use to compare two String variables - the operator == or the equals() method? 

I would personally prefer/use the equals() method to compare two Strings if I want to check the value of the Strings and the == operator if I want to check if the two variables point to the same instance of the String object. 

2. For concatenation of strings, which method is good, StringBuffer or String ? 

StringBuffer is faster than String for concatenation. Also, it is less memory/resource intensive when compared to Strings. 

3. As a continuation to the previous question - Why would you say StringBuffers are less resource intensive than Strings during Concatenation? 

As you might already know, Strings are immutable. So, when you concatenate some value to a String, you are actually creating a fresh String object that is going to hold some more data. This way you have created a new object while the old String object is still alive. As you keep concatenating values to the String, newer objects are going to get created which are going to use up the virtual memory. Whereas, if you use a StringBuffer, you are just editing the objects value rather than creating new objects. 

4. To what value is a variable of the String type automatically initialized? 

The default value of String variable is null. 

5. What is the difference between the String and StringBuffer classes? 

String objects are constants or in other words immutable while StringBuffer objects are not. 

6. What happens when you add a double value to a String? 

The result is a String object. For that matter, if you add anything to a String, you will end up with a String. 

7. What will be the result if you compare StringBuffer with String if both have same values? 

It will return false as you cannot compare String with StringBuffer directly. If you really want to compare the contents of the String & the StringBuffer you would have to invoke the equals method with the String and the toString() output of the StringBuffer. 

8. What is difference between String, StringBuffer and StringBuilder? When to use them?

For all practical understanding purposes, all these 3 classes are used to handle/manipulate Strings. The main difference between these 3 classes is:

* Strings are immutable while StringBuffer & StringBuilder objects are mutable (can be modified)

* StringBuffer is synchronized (thread safe) while StringBuilder is not. 

9. When to use Strings or StringBuffer or StringBuilder? What will drive this decision? 

The type of objects you need to create and how they will be used will drive this decision. So, 

* If the object value is not going to change, use the String class

* If the object value will be changed frequently we must choose either the StringBuffer or the StringBuilder. 

* Here, if your object will be accessed only by a single thread use StringBuilder because it is faster 

* If your object may be accessed my multiple threads use the StringBuffer because it is thread safe 

Note: Thread safety is not free and comes at the expense of performance. So, if your system is not multi-threaded then use the StringBuilder which will be much faster than the StringBuffer. 

10. Why String class is final or immutable?

The reason "Why" the string class is final is because - The developers of the Java language did not want programmers to mess with the basic functionality of the String Class. Almost all the basic or core functionality related classes in Java are final for the same reason. 

If String were not final, you could create a subclass and have two strings that look alike when you see the value in the string, but that are actually different. 

Ex: See the two string objects below, MyString and YourString are two classes that are sub-classes of the "String" class and contain the same value but their equality check might fail which does not look right. Doesnt it? 

MyString str1 = "Rocky";

YourString str2 = "Rocky";

This is why String class is final. 

If you have any questions that you want answer for, please leave a comment on this page OR drop a note to Snehal[at]TechProceed[dot]com and I will answer them.

Happy Learning!