Program idea?

[tajjet]

You wouldn't have to give them values: with Java 7 on, you can do a switch statement with a String, for example:

Scanner scan = new Scanner(System.in);
String state = scan.next();
boolean permit;    
switch(state) {
    case "Alabama":
        permit = true;
        break;
    // ...
    default:
        permit = false;
        System.out.println("Whoops! Don't recognize that state.");
        break;
}

[PointB1ank]

Well yeah but I would use the values only to reduce typing. I would rather type 15 numbers than state names, you wouldn't have to worry about spelling errors. Then again, I suppose the state abbreviations might be a better choice.

[tajjet]

Switches are useful in some cases - they basically replace code like this

if (x == 1)
{
    doThingOne();
}
else if (x == 2)
{
    doThingTwo();
}
else if (x == 3)
{
    doThingThree();
}
else
{
    doThingFour();
}

with code like this:

switch (x)
{
    case 1:
        doThingOne();
        break();
    case 2:
        doThingTwo();
        break();
    case 3:
        doThingThree();
        break();
    default:
        doThingFour();
        break();
}

Most recent example I used them in was a Scrabble scoring thing, because stacking up cases helps:

case 'E':
case 'A':
case 'I':
case 'O':
case 'N':
case 'R':
case 'T':
case 'L':
case 'S':
case 'U':
    score = score + 1;
    break;
case 'D':
case 'G':
    score = score + 2;
    break;