String to Int in java - Likely bad data, need to avoid exceptions

Question

Seeing as Java doesn\'t have nullable types, nor does it have a TryParse(), how do you handle input validation without throwing an exceptions?

The usual way:

Answer 1

That's pretty much it, although returning MIN_VALUE is kind of questionable, unless you're sure it's the right thing to use for what you're essentially using as an error code. At the very least I'd document the error code behavior, though.

Might also be useful (depending on the application) to log the bad input so you can trace.