Immutable class in java

In this article, we will understand the meaning of immutable class in java, how to create custom immutable class with example.

Immutable meaning
Literal meaning of immutable is “not changing” or “unable to be changed”. When relating this word to a java object, it means an object whose state cannot be changed once the object is created.

State of an object is composed of its fields(or instance variables). In simple terms,
an immutable object is one whose field values cannot be changed after the object is created.
Class of such an object is an immutable class.

Use of Immutable Class
Instances of immutable class are non-changeable in terms of their state. This characteristic makes them ideal to be used :

1. In caching. Load these objects with static data which is required by the application and use them across.
   Since they are immutable, the data they hold will never be modified and you will get consistent data across the application.
2. In multi-thread applications. Objects, in such applications are shared by many threads and you would not want data of one thread to be manipulated by any other thread.
   Thus, immutable objects would be of great help since its data can never be manipulated.

Create immutable class in java
In order to create a custom immutable class in java, certain rules need to be followed. They are outlined below :

1. Make the class final : This is required so that the class can not be extended and modified by exposing methods to change the state of its object.
2. Make all the fields private : This is required so that the fields cannot be accessed from outside the class for modification.
3. Make the fields final : This is done so that the fields are initialized only once from inside the constructor only.
4. Remove all setter methods : So that field values are not modified from outside the class.
5. If the class has any other object as a field(or instance variable) and this object is mutable, then make a copy of this object in the constructor before assigning it to the corresponding field of immutable class.
6. If the class has a mutable object as a field(or instance variable), make sure to return a deep copy of this object from the getter method of this field.

Immutable class example
An example of immutable class is shown below.

public final class Employee { 
  private final String name; 
  private final String id; 
  /** 
   * Constructor 
   * @param empName 
   * @param eid */ 
  public Employee(String empName, String eid) { 
    name = empName; 
    id = eid; 
  } 
 
  /** 
   * Getter methods 
   */ 
  public String getName() { 
    return name; 
  } 

  public String getId() { 
    return id; 
  } 
}

Above class represents an Employee with name and id fields.
Note that both its fields are final and private with no setter method. Thus, their value can only be set once through the constructor at the time of creation of Employee object.

Immutable class with a Mutable object
Let’s say, a new field is added to our Employee class. This field is of class EmployeeDetail as given below.

public class EmployeeDetail { 
   private int age; 
   private double height; 
   private String address; 
  
   /** 
    * Getter and Setter methods 
   */ 
   public int getAge() { 
      return age; 
   } 
 
   public void setAge(int age) { 
      this.age = age; 
   } public 

   public double getHeight() { 
      return height; 
   } 

   public void setHeight(double height) { 
      this.height = height; 
   } 
 
   public String getAddress() { 
      return address; 
   } 

   public void setAddress(String address) { 
      this.address = address; 
   }
}

This class is not immutable. All its fields have a public setter method and their values can be easily changed externally.

Now, a field of this type is added to our Employee class. Modified version of Employee class is given below.

public final class Employee { 
   private final String name; 
   private final String id; 
   private final EmployeeDetail details; 
 
   /** 
    * Constructor 
    * @param empName
    * @param eid
    * @param empHeight
    */ 
   public Employee(String empName, String eid, 
     EmployeeDetail empDetails) { 
      name = empName; 
      id = eid; 
      details = empDetails; 
   } 

   /** 
    * Getter methods 
    */ 
   public String getName() { 
      return name; 
   } 

   public String getId() { 
      return id; 
   } 

   public EmployeeDetail getDetails() { 
      return details; 
   }
}

This field is also final and has no public setter method.

Effect of Mutable object in Immutable class
In the above section of creating immutable class, there were points 5 and 6 that stated :

1. If an immutable class has a mutable object, then its copy must be assigned to the field in the constructor.
2. If an immutable class has a mutable object, then its copy should be returned from the getter method of this field.

But these points are not followed in the updated Employee class above since we are not creating a copy of EmployeeDetail in constructor of Employee and not returning a copy of EmployeeDetail from getDetails method.
Well Yes, they are not followed and that is why Employee class is no more immutable.
Have a look at the below code snippet.

public static void main(String[] args) { 
   // create EmployeeDetail object 
   EmployeeDetail details = new EmployeeDetail(); 
   details.setAddress("California"); 
   details.setAge(25); 
   details.setHeight(5.7); 

   // create employee object using these details 
   Employee emp = new Employee("Abc", "00410", details); 
   // print height 
   System.out.println("Employee height is " + 
      emp.getDetails().getHeight()); 
   // change height of employee details object 
   details.setHeight(6.0); 
   // again print height 
   System.out.println("Employee height is " + 
      emp.getDetails().getHeight()); 
}

Output will be

You can see that the class is no longer immutable since the height is modified.

Above problem can be solved by following point no 5, that is, assigning a copy of mutable object field in the constructor of immutable class.
Modified constructor is shown below.

public Employee(String empName, String eid, 
   EmployeeDetail empDetails) { 
   name = empName; 
   id = eid; 
   // create a copy of the mutable field 
   EmployeeDetail copyObject = new EmployeeDetail(); 
   // populate it with actual object values 
   copyObject.setAddress(empDetails.getAddress()); 
   copyObject.setAge(empDetails.getAge()); 
   copyObject.setHeight(empDetails.getHeight()); 
   // assign the copy object to the mutable field 
   details = copyObject; 
}

Now running the same code which creates Employee object and then changes the height of the employee will give the following output.

This is because we have assigned EmployeeDetail object populated with initial values to the Employee object once during its creation.
Now changing the EmployeeDetail will have no effect on Employee object since it has its own copy of EmployeeDetail.

Returning mutable object from immutable class
Our Employee class returns an object of EmployeeDetail from its getDetails method. This is the same object that is created from the constructor of Employee class. Remember that EmployeeDetail is not immutable.

Let’s understand what is the impact returning a mutable object from an immutable class.
Have a look at below code.

public static void main(String[] args) { 
   // create a details object 
   EmployeeDetail details = new EmployeeDetail(); 
   details.setAddress("California"); 
   details.setAge(25); 
   details.setHeight(5.7); 
   // create employee object using these details 
   Employee emp = new Employee("Abc", "00410", details); 
   // print height 
   System.out.println("Employee height is " + 
     emp.getDetails().getHeight()); 
   // get details object from immutable object and change its height 
   emp.getDetails().setHeight(6.0); 
   // again print height 
   System.out.println("Employee height is " + emp.getDetails().getHeight()); 
}

 

Output of this code will be

Again the class is not immutable since the height is changed
Reason is that the above code gets a mutable EmployeeDetail object from getDetails method. When its value is modified using a setter method, this, in turn changes the actual immutable object.

This problem can be corrected by making a copy of the mutable object and returning it from its getter method from immutable class as shown below.

public EmployeeDetail getDetails() { 
   // create a copy of the mutable field 
   EmployeeDetail copyObject = new EmployeeDetail(); 
   // populate it with actual object values 
   copyObject.setAddress(details.getAddress()); 
   copyObject.setAge(details.getAge()); 
   copyObject.setHeight(details.getHeight()); 
   return copyObject; 
}

Running the above code again will now print

With all the above changes incorporated, now the Employee class is immutable.
All its primitive fields are final and cannot be changed while any attempt to modify the mutable object field will always create a new object with actual values.

Immutable classes in Java Api
Java has many builtin classes which are immutable. You cannot change the state of their objects once created and if you are able to change, then you will be getting a new object with its contents copied from actual object.
Following are some immutable classes from Java api.

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