In Java, if null pointers rarely occur, it’s best to use catch instead of if

Clean up some loose in my Android application. I found a null pointer exception in the developer console. This has never happened. I guess this is a rare competitive condition

For those who don't know: Android allows users to report crashes (i.e. uncapped exceptions) to developers

When I came across the infamous if (...! = null), I had started typing: there were only three reports So it rarely happens

So I want to know: in this case, performance wise: would it be better to catch null pointer exceptions?

Considering that if. Is evaluated every time

Solution

Don't sound like a fanatic or narrow-minded person, but I firmly believe that NPE should never be allowed to happen first! In my opinion, capturing NPE is a very bad practice This means that you don't fully understand how the code works

The first thing you should always do before using some input is to check for null