org.eclipse.jdt.annotation

Annotation Type NonNull

@Documented
@Retention(value=CLASS)
@Target(value={FIELD,METHOD,PARAMETER,LOCAL_VARIABLE})
public @interface NonNull

Qualifier for a type in a method signature or a local variable declaration: The entity (return value, parameter, field, local variable) whose type has this annotation can never have the value null at runtime.

This has two consequences:

1. Dereferencing the entity is safe, i.e., no NullPointerException can occur at runtime.
2. An attempt to bind a null value to the entity is a compile time error.

For the second case, diagnostics issued by the compiler should distinguish three situations:

1. Nullness of the value can be statically determined, the entity is definitely bound from either of:
   • the value null, or
   • an entity with a @Nullable type.
2. Nullness cannot definitely be determined, because different code branches yield different results.
3. Nullness cannot be determined, because other program elements are involved for which null annotations are lacking.

Since:

1.0