Function returns object

Question

My question is-
1) what happens(physically on computer memory) when you create an object? do each object get its own memory in Heap and what is the life time of the object.
2) what happens when you return an object from a function?
My doubt:- I think when an object is returned it is returned along with the varibale(values) with it. so that other it can be saved to another variable.
3) How does a object get returned? Is object returned as an struct or string?(Physical structure).
Can I save it to any varibale(int,string, float).
Please help me out...............................thanks
_I have a class webuser_
public class WebUser
public String userName;
public String application;
public String getUserName()
{return userName;}
public void setUserName(String userName){     this.userName = userName;}
public String getApplication(){return application;}     
public void setApplication(String application){this.application = application;}
Another class* just returns this object
public WebUser getProfile(String userName, String application)
WebUser webUser = new WebUser();
webUser.setApplication(application);
webUser.setUserName(userName);           
return webUser;
In my coldfusion program I am saving the it  to a variable
<cfset sha=WebUser.getprofile("mother","Home")/>
How is it saved? Is ir returned as a struct or is it returned as a string.

Answer 1

shafiur wrote:
It means can you express it to me in lay terms
"Each object gets its own memory on the heap but only what's specific for each object gets stored."
Lets suppose a class has
Class A
public static void main(String args[])
int x=5;
String s="Muddu";
float y=1.505;
float z;
z=add(x,y);
public float add(int a, int b)
float m;
m=a+b;
return m;
in other class
class b
A a=new A();//What happens here(how is it get stored here. What does a have now. does it have its variables with it stored in heap.
class C
A b=new A();///Now what happens to this object. Is it different from the other one. If I change variable values here, does it effect my object a in the class b.
Sorry for this dummy questions. But I get confused by this.
}When you do
A a = new A(); it creates an A object, and assigns a reference to it to variable "a".
If you later do a = new A(); again, then you will create another A object, and put a reference to it into "a", which will then lose its reference to the first A object. That first object is then eligible for GC, if nothing else is referring to it.
Then, if you do A a2 = a; you are not creating or copying an object. You're just copying the reference from "a" to "a2", so both variables point to the same object.