In Java, you can have a section of code inside a class definition that looks like this:code: static { // statements go here }and the statements will be executed when the class is loaded (sort of ...

It’s not easy to keep up with Java’s frequent feature releases. If you missed sealed classes, text blocks, records, the new string methods, or the Optional class, let’s fix that.

This installment in the Essential Java language features tour addresses the first four small language features from that list — try-with-resources, switch-on-string, multi-catch, and final re ...