How to catch the return object

Question

this one is my code
private static select(){
String URL = "jdbc:mysql://localhost/Chat";
String username = "root";
String password = "";          
Vector result = new Vector();
try {
     Class.forName("com.mysql.jdbc.Driver").newInstance();
        } catch (Exception e) {
            System.out.println("Failed to load MySQL driver.");
Statement stmt = null;
Connection con=null;
try {
con = DriverManager.getConnection(URL,username,password);
stmt = con.createStatement();
ResultSet RS = stmt.executeQuery("SELECT * FROM message;");        
         while(RS.next()){
            String command = RS.getString("command");
            String source = RS.getString("source");
            String target = RS.getString("target");
            String message = RS.getString("message");
            String typeuser = RS.getString("typeuser");
            String photouser = RS.getString("photouser");              
            String temp = command+"?"+source+"?"+target+"?"+message+"?"+typeuser+"?"+photouser;
        result.addElement(temp);
           RS.close();
        stmt.close();
           con.close();                
} catch(SQLException e) {
            System.err.println("******SQLException : *******");
            while (e != null)
              System.out.println("Message : "+e.getMessage());
              System.out.println("Etat : "+e.getSQLState());
              System.out.println("Code Erreur : "+e.getErrorCode()+"\n");
              e = e.getNextException();
return *******?; // what should i write here since i want to catch the value of vector, and use it in somewhere else       
    }

Answer 1

Okay, this method makes no sense. But, if you want it to return a Vector, then it needs to have a return type of Vector.private static Vector select()Then use the return statement as such:return result; // as result is the name of you VectorYou then call the method as such:Vector v = select();I still don't understand the purpose of the method. Why is it static?
Methinks someone needs to go back to basics of Java programming.
Hope that helps, though.
James