Questions about Static Initialiser Syntax

Question

Here is a simple script:
public class Radio
private int station;
public Radio(int x)
System.out.println("Constructing a Radio");
station = x;
static {
System.out.println("Inside static initialiser");
I was wondering how when you instantiate a radio object the Static initialiser method runs first before creating the radio. It is clear that it comes after Radio() in the script so how does the JVM know to jump to static and then back to Radio()?
thanks
Richard.

Answer 1

A compiled java class contains two hidden methods, one called "<clinit>" which does the static intialisation and one called "<init>" which does the instance initialization. All the static initialisation which means any explicitly initialized static fields and static blocks are gatherered into the <clinit> method, in the order they are encountered. All the instance field initialisation (and any instance initializer blocks) are gathered into the <init> method (you'll sometimes see these names on stack traces).
The first time you "actively use" a class <clinit> will be called first. When you instanciate a class the <init> method is called prior to any constructor code.