What is called a forward reference in Java?

Question

I have been through this question on legality of forward references but not clear as to what is meant by forward references in Java language . Can someone ple

Answer 1

In simple terms it means referencing (accessing a variable, calling a function) that is further down in the code file.

   static int x=getY();
   static int y=5;
   static int getY() { return y; }

• x's value is set to the result of getY()
• getY() is called before y's value is set to 5
• x's value is therefore 0 (default integer)
• y's value is 5