Java Syntax: byte f()[] vs. byte[] f()

Question

Just noticed in ByteArrayOutputStream, the toByteArray() is declared as,

public synchronized byte toByteArray()[];

What's the difference between this declaration and the following one?

public synchronized byte[] toByteArray();

Dup of http://stackoverflow.com/questions/129178/difference-between-int-array-and-int-array — skaffman, Sep 04 '09 at 16:25
Not a dup, the horrible syntax for array return types is new here. I wouldn't have imagined this could be legal Java. — starblue, Sep 04 '09 at 20:30

score 5 · Accepted Answer · answered Sep 04 '09 at 16:17

5

In this case, none.

If you had declarations:

byte[] a, b;
byte c[], d;

then a, b, and c are byte[], and d is byte.

answered Sep 04 '09 at 16:17

score 3 · Answer 2 · answered Sep 04 '09 at 16:19

3

There is no difference, though convention amongst programmers strongly prefers the latter.

answered Sep 04 '09 at 16:19

Brett Kail

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Sep 04 '09 at 19:09

0

Java coding conventions document recommends the second variant (byte[] b). See example.

answered Sep 04 '09 at 19:09

Roman

score 0 · Answer 4 · answered May 24 '11 at 05:18

0

BTW, for multidimensional arrays you can also mix both approaches:

public synchronized byte[] to2DByteArray()[];

answered May 24 '11 at 05:18

beetoom

Well that is the path down the the hell of confusion :/ – Gamlor May 24 '11 at 10:45

4 Answers4