the "This" keyword

[Calibretto]

Im new to java, this being my first semester, and i cant for the life of me figure out one of the applications of the "this" keyword. I understand its use in constructors as a way to overload them and pass parameters but when its used like:

this.copyright=copyright;

for instance, i have no idea what its supposed to be doing. Ive read my book but its little help on that one and my professor hasnt been returning my email so.....any help you could give would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[gtloafer]

Ok my 2 cents, 'this' gives a java class the ability to refer to itself when performing an action ...


Lets say you have the following class

public class Test {
//member field
String copyright = null;

Test(String copyright)//constructor
{
copyright=copyright;
}
}

Lets say that the chap who coded this class wanted the constructor to take the copyright parameter and assign it to a class field member of the same name.

This wouldn't work. Why ? because of the scope of the parameter copyright variable, see java looks at that assignment and sees it as the local copyright (the copyright you passed as a parameter) assigning the same variable to itself. At then end of the constructor 'poof' the local copyright has gone out of scope and into limbo some place, and during this while the class member called copyright would not have been affected in any way.

How would you tell java 'hey I need you to assign this to my class member' ? Enter the 'this' keyword.

now if we changed the statement to

this.copyright= copyright

java now understands that you are trying to assign the parameter value to the member of the class rather than to the 'copyright' parameter itself.

Hope that made sense....

~gtloafer

[Calibretto]

it did make sense, thank you very much