Java™ How To Program (Early Objects), Tenth Edition

3.2.5 Additional Notes on Class AccountTest

static Method main

In Chapter 2, each class we declared had one method named main. Recall that main is a special method that’s always called automatically by the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) when you execute an app. You must call most other methods explicitly to tell them to perform their tasks.

Lines 7–27 of Fig. 3.2 declare method main. A key part of enabling the JVM to locate and call method main to begin the app’s execution is the static keyword (line 7), which indicates that main is a static method. A static method is special, because you can call it without first creating an object of the class in which the method is declared—in this case class AccountTest. We discuss static methods in detail ...