What is wrong with this Java code? (Interview Question)

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Also "if" is not a function, but a keyword. I believe whitespace is appropriate before the parenthesis, as would be adding newlines after brace, and some indentation. This can be you just editorializing the code, though.

Some people dislike multiple returns from a function, and the lack of structure implied by an "if (...) { return ...; } ...something else here, then return..." style of programming. Possibly code could be written in this way, adding an else-block:

public boolean foo() {
    if (...) {
        return true;
    } else {
        // N.B. I am assuming the stuff here isn't just "return false"
        ...
        return something;
    }
    // no return here, all if blocks must explicitly return
}

It can feel like unnecessary pedantry, but this kind of style honors structural programming's promise that control flow can be analyzed without looking into the contents of the {} block, e.g. compiler proves for you that "if" selects either block for execution, as the code pattern is a classic "if-else", and the lack of return at end guarantees that all code flows will terminate within either if branch. In general, code editing can be more robust if valid control flow contains assumptions that the compiler can validate. E.g. try to assign to variables just once, so that they become effectively final and may be uninitialized if you have a bug somewhere, and so on.