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Java Java Objects Meet Objects Creating Classes

Ranak Bansal
Ranak Bansal
1,207 Points
Posted by Ranak Bansal
Ranak Bansal
1,207 Points

What is the purpose of 'dispenser.characterName'

Hi,

I understand everything in the video up until he types in dispenser.characterName in the system.out.printf function (6:25 in the video). Is this a method we have previously learned and I have just forgotten, or what?

Thanks

Soraia Carmo
Soraia Carmo
3,527 Points

Hi Ranak,

If you go back to 4:25, the instructor creates a new file, with a class named PezDispenser. In that class he creates a variable named "characterName".

The reason why he writes "dispenser.characterName" is because he's accessing that variable from the PezDispenser class (which was initialised in Example.java as "dispenser" ==> PezDispenser dispenser = new PezDispenser();)

Hope it helps!

1 Answer

Andy Qui Le
Andy Qui Le
10,130 Points
Andy Qui Le
Andy Qui Le
10,130 Points

I just want to offer you my explanation: Since we have the blueprint PezDispenser, aka class, we can create many instances of that class with the keyword new in Java. Inside class PezDispenser, there is data field known as characterName. This data field is associated with each and every instance created from the class PezDispenser. And we can directly access this data field with the dot notation in Java: specifying name of the object followed by a dot (period) followed by the name of data field/property. When Craig creates an instance of class PezDispenser named dispenser, we can retrieve the name of this instance as follows: dispenser.characterName (So this is not a method, but rather a property of a PezDispenser instance that we can access with dot notation).