Using BigDecimal to work with currencies

I would recommend a little research on Money Pattern. Martin Fowler in his book Analysis pattern has covered this in more detail.

public class Money {

    private static final Currency USD = Currency.getInstance("USD");
    private static final RoundingMode DEFAULT_ROUNDING = RoundingMode.HALF_EVEN;

    private final BigDecimal amount;
    private final Currency currency;   

    public static Money dollars(BigDecimal amount) {
        return new Money(amount, USD);
    }

    Money(BigDecimal amount, Currency currency) {
        this(amount, currency, DEFAULT_ROUNDING);
    }

    Money(BigDecimal amount, Currency currency, RoundingMode rounding) {
        this.currency = currency;      
        this.amount = amount.setScale(currency.getDefaultFractionDigits(), rounding);
    }

    public BigDecimal getAmount() {
        return amount;
    }

    public Currency getCurrency() {
        return currency;
    }

    @Override
    public String toString() {
        return getCurrency().getSymbol() + " " + getAmount();
    }

    public String toString(Locale locale) {
        return getCurrency().getSymbol(locale) + " " + getAmount();
    }   
}

Coming to the usage:

You would represent all monies using Money object as opposed to BigDecimal. Representing money as big decimal will mean that you will have the to format the money every where you display it. Just imagine if the display standard changes. You will have to make the edits all over the place. Instead using the Money pattern you centralize the formatting of money to a single location.

Money price = Money.dollars(38.28);
System.out.println(price);

I would be radical. No BigDecimal.

Here is a great article https://lemnik.wordpress.com/2011/03/25/bigdecimal-and-your-money/

Ideas from here.

import java.math.BigDecimal;

public class Main {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        testConstructors();
        testEqualsAndCompare();
        testArithmetic();
    }

    private static void testEqualsAndCompare() {
        final BigDecimal zero = new BigDecimal("0.0");
        final BigDecimal zerozero = new BigDecimal("0.00");

        boolean zerosAreEqual = zero.equals(zerozero);
        boolean zerosAreEqual2 = zerozero.equals(zero);

        System.out.println("zerosAreEqual: " + zerosAreEqual + " " + zerosAreEqual2);

        int zerosCompare = zero.compareTo(zerozero);
        int zerosCompare2 = zerozero.compareTo(zero);
        System.out.println("zerosCompare: " + zerosCompare + " " + zerosCompare2);
    }

    private static void testArithmetic() {
        try {
            BigDecimal value = new BigDecimal(1);
            value = value.divide(new BigDecimal(3));
            System.out.println(value);
        } catch (ArithmeticException e) {
            System.out.println("Failed to devide. " + e.getMessage());
        }
    }

    private static void testConstructors() {
        double doubleValue = 35.7;
        BigDecimal fromDouble = new BigDecimal(doubleValue);
        BigDecimal fromString = new BigDecimal("35.7");

        boolean decimalsEqual = fromDouble.equals(fromString);
        boolean decimalsEqual2 = fromString.equals(fromDouble);

        System.out.println("From double: " + fromDouble);
        System.out.println("decimalsEqual: " + decimalsEqual + " " + decimalsEqual2);
    }
}

It prints

From double: 35.7000000000000028421709430404007434844970703125
decimalsEqual: false false
zerosAreEqual: false false
zerosCompare: 0 0
Failed to devide. Non-terminating decimal expansion; no exact representable decimal result.

How about storing BigDecimal into a database? Hell, it also stores as a double value??? At least, if I use mongoDb without any advanced configuration it will store BigDecimal.TEN as 1E1.

Possible solutions?

I came with one - use String to store BigDecimal in Java as a String into the database. You have validation, for example @NotNull, @Min(10), etc... Then you can use a trigger on update or save to check if current string is a number you need. There are no triggers for mongo though. Is there a built-in way for Mongodb trigger function calls?

There is one drawback I am having fun around - BigDecimal as String in Swagger defenition

I need to generate swagger, so our front-end team understands that I pass them a number presented as a String. DateTime for example presented as a String.

There is another cool solution I read in the article above... Use long to store precise numbers.

A standard long value can store the current value of the Unites States national debt (as cents, not dollars) 6477 times without any overflow. Whats more: it’s an integer type, not a floating point. This makes it easier and accurate to work with, and a guaranteed behavior.

Update

https://stackoverflow.com/a/27978223/4587961

Maybe in the future MongoDb will add support for BigDecimal. https://jira.mongodb.org/browse/SERVER-1393 3.3.8 seems to have this done.

It is an example of the second approach. Use scaling. http://www.technology-ebay.de/the-teams/mobile-de/blog/mapping-bigdecimals-with-morphia-for-mongodb.html