Programmer's Guide to Java™ Certification, A: A Comprehensive Primer, Second Edition

Chapter 8. Object Lifetime

Exam Objectives State the behavior that is guaranteed by the garbage collection system. Write code that explicitly makes objects eligible for garbage collection. Recognize the point in a piece of source code at which an object becomes eligible for garbage collection.

Supplementary Objectives Write code that makes proper use of the finalization mechanism to free resources before an object is garbage collected. Distinguish between static and instance initializer expressions and initializer blocks, and how they are used for object initialization and class initialization. State the phases involved in initializing the object state when an object is created using the new operator.