ObjectInputStream() returning null and EOFException - need help

Question

I have been working on this little snippet of code all day and I cannot understand why I get null values when I run a display application. The code is posted below for 3 file. PhoneList.java is for serialization. CreatePhoneList is to populate a saved file with phone numbers and names of contacts. DisplaySavedPhoneList.java is to display the saved names and numbers. I'm not looking for the correct code, put for someone to point me in the right direction on why I'm getting these results so I can find a solution.
Here is the PhoneList class:
import java.io.*;
public class PhoneList implements Serializable
    private String name;
    private String num;
    private String phName;
    private String phNum;
    PhoneList(String phNum, String phName)
        setName(phName);
        setNum(phNum);
    public String getName()
        return phName;
    public String getNum()
        return phNum;
    public void setName(String phName)
        name = phName;
    public void setNum(String phNum)
        num = phNum;
}Here is the CreatePhoneList class
import java.io.*;
import java.util.*;
public class CreatePhoneList
    public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException
        ObjectOutputStream output = new ObjectOutputStream(new FileOutputStream("PhoneList.txt"));
        PhoneList list;
        String phName;
        String phNum;
        final String QUIT = "QUIT";
        Scanner in = new Scanner(System.in);
        System.out.println("Enter a phone number or " + QUIT + " to quit.");
        phNum = in.next();
        while(!phNum.equals(QUIT))
            System.out.println("Enter the contact name.");
            phName = in.next();
            list = new PhoneList(phNum, phName);
            output.writeObject(list);
            System.out.println("Enter a phone number or " + QUIT + " to quit.");
            phNum = in.next();
        output.close();
}and this is the DisplaySavedPhoneList class:
import java.io.*;
import java.util.*;
public class DisplaySavedPhoneList
    public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException, ClassNotFoundException
        ObjectInputStream input = new ObjectInputStream(new FileInputStream("PhoneList.txt"));
        PhoneList list;
        final int SHOW = 1;
        int showList;
        int count = 0;
        Scanner in = new Scanner(System.in);
        try
            System.out.print("To display Phone List enter " + SHOW);
            showList = in.nextInt();
            while(showList == SHOW)
                list = (PhoneList)input.readObject();
                System.out.println("Name: " + list.getName() + " Phone Number: " + list.getNum());
                count++;
        catch(EOFException e)
            System.out.println("Oops, something broke!");
            input.close();
}This is the result from running the DisplaySavedPhoneList application:
To display Phone List enter 1
1
Name: null Phone Number: null
Name: null Phone Number: null
Oops, something broke!

Answer 1

ok, I did that, and its pointing me to the line commented below. I did a practical exercise where the code was almost identical and it worked fine. The only difference are the variables.
try
            System.out.print("To display Phone List enter " + SHOW);
            showList = in.nextInt();
            while(showList == SHOW)
                list = (PhoneList)input.readObject(); //this is the line that was identified in the stacktrace
                System.out.println("Name: " + list.getName() + " Phone Number: " + list.getNum());
                count++;
        catch(EOFException e)
            System.out.println("Stack Trace");
            e.printStackTrace();
            input.close();
        }here is the total stack trace, in case you were wondering...
To display Phone List enter 1
1
Name: null Phone Number: null
java.io.EOFException
Name: null Phone Number: null
Stack Trace
        at java.io.ObjectInputStream$BlockDataInputStream.peekByte(ObjectInputStream.java:2554)
        at java.io.ObjectInputStream.readObject0(ObjectInputStream.java:1297)
        at java.io.ObjectInputStream.readObject(ObjectInputStream.java:351)
        at DisplaySavedPhoneList.main(DisplaySavedPhoneList.java:21)I'm still not quite sure what this is telling me though.