Optional in Java 8: Part 1

In this lesson, we will look at the newly introduced Optional class. We will also look at different ways of creating an Optional.

What is an Optional?

Java 8 has introduced a new class Optional<T> in the java.util package.

The Optional<T> is a wrapper class that stores an object of type T. The object may or may not be present in the optional.

According to Oracle, “Java 8 Optional works as a container type for the value which is probably absent or null. Java Optional is a final class present in the java.util package.

Let us look at how things worked before optional was introduced. In the below example, we have a getEmployee() method which gets the employee object from a Map. After fetching the employee object, we will print its details.

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