What is the best standard style for a toString implementation? [closed]

Answer 1

Personally, I find the mix of [] and {} not so easy to get an immediate view of the hierarchy.

I like this format (and I've seen it being used in a number of places):

SimpleClassName[prop1=value, prop2=value]
SimpleClassName[prop1=value, prop2=NestedObject[prop3=value]]

There's also the possibility to add an identifier with @, for example the default style for the commons-lang ToStringBuilder does that (using its own example):

Person@182f0db[name=John Doe,age=33,smoker=false]