CODEWITHSUNDEEP
java
newbie
newbie

Reputation: 24635

How can I know if Object is String type object?

I have to know if Object is String or any other class type, how can I do it? Currently I do it like below, but its not very good coding.

try {
    String myString = (String) object;
    // do stuff here
} catch(Exception e) {
    // it wasn't string, so just continue
}

Upvotes: 70

Views: 200169

Answers (8)

Player_Neo
Player_Neo

Reputation: 1665

From JDK 14+ which includes JEP 305 we can do Pattern Matching for instanceof

Patterns basically test that a value has a certain type, and can extract information from the value when it has the matching type.

Before Java 14

if (obj instanceof String) {
    String str = (String) obj; // need to declare and cast again the object
    .. str.contains(..) ..
}else{
     str = ....
}

Java 14 enhancements

if (!(obj instanceof String str)) {
    .. str.contains(..) .. // no need to declare str object again with casting
} else {
    .. str....
}

We can also combine the type check and other conditions together

if (obj instanceof String str && str.length() > 4) {.. str.contains(..) ..}

The use of pattern matching in instanceof should reduce the overall number of explicit casts in Java programs.

PS: instanceOf will only match when the object is not null, then only it can be assigned to str.

Upvotes: 4

PreethaA
PreethaA

Reputation: 925

Could you not use typeof(object) to compare against

Upvotes: 0

Martin Gross
Martin Gross

Reputation: 929

javamonkey79 is right. But don't forget what you might want to do (e.g. try something else or notify someone) if object is not an instance of String. 

String myString;
if (object instanceof String) {
  myString = (String) object;
} else {
  // do something else     
}

BTW: If you use ClassCastException instead of Exception in your code above, you can be sure that you will catch the exception caused by casting object to String. And not any other exceptions caused by other code (e.g. NullPointerExceptions).

Upvotes: 2

mR_fr0g
mR_fr0g

Reputation: 8722

Guard your cast with instanceof

String myString;
if (object instanceof String) {
  myString = (String) object;
}

Upvotes: 13

Peter Lawrey
Peter Lawrey

Reputation: 533530

Its possible you don't need to know depending on what you are doing with it.

String myString = object.toString();

or if object can be null

String myString = String.valueOf(object);

Upvotes: 1

Andreas Dolk
Andreas Dolk

Reputation: 114787

 object instanceof Type

is true if the object is a Type or a subclass of Type

 object.getClass().equals(Type.class)

is true only if the object is a Type

Upvotes: 134

Victor Sorokin
Victor Sorokin

Reputation: 12006

Either use instanceof or method Class.isAssignableFrom(Class<?> cls).

Upvotes: 2

javamonkey79
javamonkey79

Reputation: 17775

Use the instanceof syntax.

Like so:

Object foo = "";

if( foo instanceof String ) {
  // do something String related to foo
}

Upvotes: 30

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