When to use "Transient" keyword

/**

Transient used to mark a variable not to be serialized

So if you are serializing an object and you don't want to serialize a partecular variable value inside it,

Then you just make it as transient and it will not be serialized

Below example explains this concept

*/

package javabeat.samples;

import java.io.FileInputStream;

import java.io.FileOutputStream;

import java.io.IOException;

import java.io.ObjectInputStream;

import java.io.ObjectOutputStream;

import java.io.Serializable;

class NameStore implements Serializable{

private String firstName;

private transient String middleName;

private String lastName;

public NameStore (String fName,

String mName,

String lName){

this.firstName = fName;

this.middleName = mName;

this.lastName = lName;

}

public String toString(){

StringBuffer sb = new StringBuffer(40);

sb.append("First Name : ");

sb.append(this.firstName);

sb.append("Middle Name : ");

sb.append(this.middleName);

sb.append("Last Name : ");

sb.append(this.lastName);

return sb.toString();

}

}

public class TransientExample{

public static void main(String args[]) throws Exception {

NameStore nameStore = new NameStore("Steve",

"Middle","Jobs");

ObjectOutputStream o = new ObjectOutputStream

(new FileOutputStream("nameStore"));

// writing to object

o.writeObject(nameStore);

o.close();

// reading from object

ObjectInputStream in =new ObjectInputStream(

new FileInputStream("nameStore"));

NameStore nameStore1 = (NameStore)in.readObject();

System.out.println(nameStore1);

}

}

// output will be :

First Name : Steve

Middle Name : null

Last Name : Jobs