What causes “Can't find Symbol” and how to fix it?

Question

I\'ve been trying to figure this out, I\'ve run it in different programs so it\'s definitely in the code. Probably something easy too. The error says

Answer 1

It can't find the variable password, which, as you've coded it, only exists in the Password2 constructor. You'll need to either make password a class member variable or pass it to the constructor of your Handler classes, so they can have a reference to it.

Answer 2

password 

is a local variable declared in the constructor of Password2. It is not in scope in your EnterButtonHandler.actionPerformed method. Make it an instance variable to resolve.

Answer 3

Read the error message, love the error message.

It takes some practice, but after awhile it's easy to see it more clearly: just read across the bold text below as a sentence :)

error: cannot find symbol [...]

symbol: variable password

location: [in] class Password2.EnterButtonHandler

There is nothing named password in that scope/context (EnterButtonHandler).

Happy coding.

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Hint: there is a local variable with the same name in a different scope/context... perhaps it shouldn't be a local variable? See The Java Tutorial: Variables for more :)

Answer 4

Your class doesn't have a definition for password. Hence, the error when passing it to the equals method.

Answer 5

password is local to the Password2 constructor.

It should either be passed around, or an instance variable.