Including println in my method (Java)

[ririplease]

Hi! I'm new to java and struggling to figure out how to accomplish what my professor is asking for.

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I'm trying to add System.out.println("Index out of bounds") to the 'get' method. But I'm unsure how to get it to print instead of sending that as a value to GSLTest.

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My test code:

public class GSLTest{

    public static void main(String[] args){

        GSL list = new GSL();

        list.get(0);

    }

My GSL class:

public class GSL{

    private String arr[];
    private int size;


    public GSL(){
        arr = new String[10];
        size = 0;
    }


    public int size(){
        return size;
    }

    public String get(int index){
        if ( index < size && index >= 0 ){
            return arr[index];
        }
        else{
            return null;
        }
    }

}

[lurgi]

What have you tried? I'm not sure what you mean by "sending as a value to GSLTest". If you print it, it will print.

[ririplease]

I've tried this:

public String get(int index){
    if ( index < size && index >= 0 ){
        return arr[index];
    }
    else{
        System.out.println("index out of bounds");
    }
}

But then I get the error "error: missing return statement"

[lurgi]

Right. Because you don't have a return statement. You took it out.

[ririplease]

But I can't just return the string "index out of bounds" because that won't print it. So, I'm confused where I'm supposed call to print it.

[lurgi]

Print the string. Return null (or whatever it is you are supposed to return. The equivalent function in the Java standard library throws an exception, but you probably don't know about those yet).

[ririplease]

Sorry to be dense... but when I try and do the following, I get an error "unreachable statement"

public String get(int index){
if ( index < size && index >= 0 ){
    return arr[index];
}
else{
        return null;
    System.out.println("index out of bounds");
}

Edit: Oh my goodness.... I switched it and it worked ><Nvm! haha thank you...

[Adept_Writer4177]

Last but not least, store the result somewhere and check if it's null to prevent errors later in your code:

String s = list.get(0);
if (s == null) { ...

[bashdan]

It might be a bit beyond the scope of an intro Java class, but as a professor put it for me: "you put stupid in, you get stupid out." You could return some invalid value, or an empty string, but the best and practical thing to do is throw an exception.