non-static variable this cannot be referenced from a static context

Question

The error comes from this line BoardState addme = new BoardState();

For some reason the non-static variable that it is pointing at is \"new\". I am unclear of h

Answer 1

The reason it doesn't work is because your class BoardState is an inner, non-static, class inside of IntelligentTicTacToe. This means that when referring to it, you'll be referring to an instance of the class; the instance isn't available from a static context.

One solution is to declare that class as:

public static class BoardState {

You can read more on inner classes here.

Answer 2

Don't nest classes like you're doing. There's no need, and all it's going to do is to require that you create a BoardState object on top of an IntelligentTicTacToe instance, i.e.,

BoardState addme = new IntelligentTicTacToe(). new BoardState();

but this should not be a requirement of your program.

Solution: Put the BoardState class where it belongs, in its own file. Or make BoardState an enum, but then it should only hold constants.