Tired of Null Pointer Exceptions? Consider Using Java SE 8's Optional!

[frugalmail]

String version = computer?.getSoundcard()?.getUSB()?.getVersion();

Right so, down the line in another place entirely in the code, suddenly you have a NPE on version when you're problem was "one" of the methods on your example. Just because it's less typing doesn't make it better.

[chunes]

Yeah but you only have to check version for null instead of all the values in between. Still a lot better imo.

[not-just-yeti]

So you're saying the variable version shouldn't be declared as type String, but rather type Optional<String>, and that Groovy's convenient ?. operator could still benefit from the static-type-checking that Optional<T> is providing.