Why do we have the option of passing class loader to get resource bundle

[Vijay Venkat]

Please see method below, which takes parameter ClassLoader,

public static ResourceBundle getBundle(String baseName,
Locale locale,
ClassLoader loader)

How does this help and what is the exact use of passing a class loader instance. Can anyone let me know or point me to articles on this.

Thanks,
Vijay Venkat

[David O'Meara]

The API docs for this method are pretty concise. I'd start there first.

Dave

[Vijay Venkat]

I don't think it really helps me understand. I am just wondering what could be the advanteage of doing so.

With out passing the class loader instance, the logic it would follow to get class loader would be something like

ClassLoader loader = Thread.currentThread().getContextClassLoader();
if (loader == null)
loader = ClassLoader.getSystemClassLoader();

This can be done always. Just wondering why we have the option of passing the class loader instance to the bundle.

Thanks,
Vijay Venkat

[Paul Sturrock]

So you can define which classloader to load the bundle from. So you'd use it if you wanted a ClassLoader other than that which loaded the calling class to load the bundle. (Your understanding is a little off - its not necessarily going to be the system class loader the ResourceBundle.getResource() method will check).