Why does the Java Compiler complain on using forea

Question

This question already has answers here:

What is a raw type and why shouldn't we use it? (15 answers)

Closed 3 years ago.

I got a strange compiler error when using generics within a for-each loop in Java. Is this a Java compiler bug, or am I really missing something here?

Here is my whole class:

public class Generics<T extends Object> {
  public Generics(T myObject){
    // I didn't really need myObject
  }

  public List<String> getList(){
    List<String> list = new ArrayList<String>();
    list.add("w00t StackOverflow");
    return list;
  }

  public static void main(String...a){
    Generics generics = new Generics(new Object());
    for(String s : generics.getList()){
      System.out.println(s);
    }
  }
}

The compiler is complaining about the line with the for-each: "Type mismatch cannot convert from element type Object to String."
If I make this subtle change, it compiles:

public static void main(String...a){
  Generics<?> generics = new Generics(new Object());
  for(String s : generics.getList()){
    System.out.println(s);
  }
}

I know getList() does use generics, but it uses them in what I thought was a completely unrelated way. I could understand this if I were trying to iterate over something of type T and getList() returned a List<T> or something, but that's not the case here. The return type of getList() should have absolutely nothing to do with T and shouldn't care whether I use the raw type for my Generics object or not...right? Shouldn't these be completely unrelated, or am I really missing something here?

Note that the code also compiles if I do this, which I thought should have been equivalent to the first as well:

public static void main(String...a){
  Generics generics = new Generics(new Object());
  List<String> list = generics.getList();
  for(String s : list){
    System.out.println(s);
  }
}

Answer 1

Change the line

Generics generics = new Generics(new Object());

to

Generics<?> generics = new Generics<Object>(new Object());

The root of your problem is that you are using a raw type so the type of the getList method is List, not List<String>.

Answer 2

I made a couple adjustments to your code. You see in your comment you don't need Object in your constructor, so lets remove that to avoid any confusion. Second, if Generics is going to be generic, initialize it properly

Here is what the new main would look like

public static void main(String...a){
    Generics<String> generics = new Generics<String>();
    for(String s : generics.getList()){
      System.out.println(s);
    }
  }

Answer 3

The difference is that when you use the raw type, all the generic references within the member signatures are converted to their raw forms too. So effectively you're calling a method which now has a signature like this:

List getList()

Now as for why your final version compiles - although it does, there's a warning if you use -Xlint:

Generics.java:16: warning: [unchecked] unchecked conversion
    List<String> list = generics.getList();
                                        ^

This is similar to:

 List list = new ArrayList();
 List<String> strings = list;

... which also compiles, but with a warning under -Xlint.

The moral of the story: don't use raw types!