char conversion in ternary operator in Java, prints int value instead of char value

Question

In Java, you can cast char to int and vice-versa, using the char value or the ASCII value. If you cast an int variable to a char, you get the corresponding character. So, the following snippet will print 'a':

int x = 97;
System.out.println( (char)x ); // 'a'

But when I do this:

char ch = 'a', ch2 = 97, ch3 = 'b';
System.out.println( ( (ch+=1) > ch2 ) ? (char)ch2 : (int)ch3 );

the compiler prints out the int value 97, not 'a', even though the ternary operator return value on the 'true side' is (char)ch2. So I expected 'a' instead of 97. Why does it print 97 instead of 'a'?

Answer 1

The problem is that in:

System.out.println( ( (ch+=1) > ch2 ) ? (char)ch2 : (int)ch3 );

because you have (int)ch3 the compiler assumes that the returning type of the ternary operator will be an int .

Check the following highlighted rule from 15.25. Conditional Operator? :

If you do

System.out.println( ( (ch+=1) > ch2 ) ? (char)ch2 : (char)ch3 );

it will print

'a'

Alternatively, you can apply brute-force ie cast the final result into char as shown below:

System.out.println( (char) (( (ch+=1) > ch2 ) ? (char)ch2 : (int)ch3 ));

it will also print

 'a'