What is the default initialization of an array in Java?

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So I'm declaring and initializing an int array:

static final int UN = 0;
int[] arr = new int[size];
for (int i = 0; i < size; i++) {
    arr[i] = UN;
}

Say I do this instead...

int[] arr = new int[5];
System.out.println(arr[0]);

... 0 will print to standard out. Also, if I do this:

static final int UN = 0;
int[] arr = new int[5];
System.out.println(arr[0]==UN);

... true will print to standard out. So how is Java initializing my array by default? Is it safe to assume that the default initialization is setting the array indices to 0 which would mean I don't have to loop through the array and initialize it?

Thanks.

8 Answers

If you want to initialize the array to different value you can use the Arrays.fill() method. This method will help you to set the value for every elements of the array.

import java.util.Arrays;

public class ArraysFillExample {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        // Assign -1 to each elements of numbers array
        int[] numbers = new int[5];
        Arrays.fill(numbers, -1);
        System.out.println("Numbers: " + Arrays.toString(numbers));

        // Assign 1.0f to each elements of prices array
        float[] prices = new float[5];
        Arrays.fill(prices, 1.0f);
        System.out.println("Prices : " + Arrays.toString(prices));

        // Assign empty string to each elements of words array
        String[] words = new String[5];
        Arrays.fill(words, "");
        System.out.println("Words  : " + Arrays.toString(words));

        // Assign 9 to each elements of the multi array
        int[][] multi = new int[3][3];
        for (int[] array : multi) {
            Arrays.fill(array, 9);
        }
        System.out.println("Multi  : " + Arrays.deepToString(multi));
    }
}

The output of the code snippet above are:

Numbers: [-1, -1, -1, -1, -1]
Prices : [1.0, 1.0, 1.0, 1.0, 1.0]
Words  : [, , , , ]
Multi  : [[9, 9, 9], [9, 9, 9], [9, 9, 9]]

ref: https://kodejava.org/how-do-i-fill-array-with-non-default-value/

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