Re: How to satisfy the code checker in this instance?

From:

Jim Janney <jjanney@shell.xmission.com>

Newsgroups:

comp.lang.java.programmer

Date:

Thu, 17 Dec 2009 14:47:26 -0700

Message-ID:

<2pljh1nuhd.fsf@shell.xmission.com>

laredotornado <laredotornado@zipmail.com> writes:

Hi,

I'm using Java 1.5 with a code checker named PMD. It is complaining
about the following method ...

    private static Date parse(final String dateStr, final String
dateFormat) {
        Date date = null;
        try {
            final DateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat(dateFormat,
Locale.getDefault());
            date = sdf.parse(dateStr);
        } catch (Exception e) {
            LOGGER.error("Could not parse time:" + dateStr, e);
        }
        return date;
    } // parse

specifically, complaining about the fact that the variable "Date date
= null" is redefined -- first set to null and then later set to a new
value (Found 'DD' anomaly for variable date). Yes, quite a bizarre
warning, but do you know how to rewrite the above to preserve the
functionality while not redefining the variable?

Thanks, - Dave

private static Date parse(final String dateStr, final String dateFormat) {
final DateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat(dateFormat, Locale.getDefault());
return sdf.parse(dateStr);
}

According to the javadoc for SimpleDateFormat.parse(String), it
returns null in case of error, so no exception handling is needed.

--
Jim Janney