Java, A Beginner's Guide, 5th Edition, 5th Edition

Understanding static

There will be times when you will want to define a class member that will be used independently of any object of that class. Normally a class member must be accessed through an object of its class, but it is possible to create a member that can be used by itself, without reference to a specific instance. To create such a member, precede its declaration with the keyword static. When a member is declared static, it can be accessed before any objects of its class are created, and without reference to any object. You can declare both methods and variables to be static. The most common example of a static member is main( ). main( ) is declared as static because it must be called by the JVM when your program begins. Outside the ...