What are the benefits of “String”.equals(otherString)

Question

in a tutorial (for implementing a xml parser) i saw the following code:

if( \"NODENAME\".equals(xmlreader.getNodeName()) ) {  // getNodeName() returns java.l         


        

Answer 1

If you have code:

if( "NODENAME".equals(xmlreader.getNodeName()) ){...}

It will avoid NullPointerException when xmlreader.getNodeName() is null since

"NODENAME".equals(null)

will return false instead of NullPointerException.

PS: Keep in mind that if for some reason xmlreader itself is null then:

"NODENAME".equals(xmlreader.getNodeName())

can still throw NullPointerException.