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Java Java Objects Delivering the MVP Forum

Chastain Marchildon
Chastain Marchildon
905 Points

Forum exercise step 4 NullPointerException Forum.java line 17

Ive completed all the other steps and now I seem to have a pointer pointing at nothing, but I'm blind as to where I went wrong

Forum.java
public class Forum {
  private String topic;

  // TODO: add a constructor that accepts a topic and sets the private field topic
  public Forum(String topic){
   this.topic=topic; 
  }
  public String getTopic() {
    return topic;
  }



  public void addPost(ForumPost post) {
    System.out.printf("A new post in %s topic from %s %s about %s is available",
            topic,
            post.getAuthor().getFirstName(),
            post.getAuthor().getLastName(),
            post.getTitle()
    );
  }


}
User.java
public class User {
  // TODO: add private fields for firstName and lastName
  private String firstName;
  private String lastName;
  public User(String firstName, String lastName) {
    // TODO: set and add the private fields
  this.firstName=firstName;
  this.lastName=lastName;
  }
  public String getFirstName(){
   return firstName; 
  }
  public String getLastName(){
   return lastName; 
  }
  // TODO: add getters for firstName and lastName

}
ForumPost.java
public class ForumPost {
  private User author;
  private String title;
  private String description;

  // TODO: add a constructor that accepts the author, title and description

  public ForumPost(User author, String title, String description){
    this.author=getAuthor();
    this.title=getTitle();
    this.description=getDescription();

  }

  public User getAuthor() {
    return author;
  }

  public String getTitle() {
    return title;
  }

  public String getDescription() {
    return description;
  }
}
Main.java
public class Main {

  public static void main(String[] args) {
    System.out.println("Beginning forum example");
    if (args.length < 2) {
      System.out.println("Usage: java Main <first name> <last name>");
      System.err.println("<first name> and <last name> are required");
      System.exit(1);
    }

    Forum forum = new Forum("Java");
    // TODO: pass in the first name and last name that are in the args parameter

    User author = new User(args[0],args[1]);
    // TODO: initialize the forum post with the user created above and a title and description of your choice
    ForumPost post = new ForumPost(author,"Title String","program");
    forum.addPost(post);


  }

}

1 Answer

james south
seal-mask
.a{fill-rule:evenodd;}techdegree seal-36
james south
Front End Web Development Techdegree Graduate 33,271 Points

your forumpost constructor is a problem, you have circular logic going on. you are setting this.author etc as the return of the respective getter methods, but the values returned by those methods come from the arguments passed into the constructor in the first place. in the constructor this.xyz=xyz is the proper initialization syntax, xyz being the parameter.