Should I declare IllegalArgumentException in my method declaration

Question

Hi,
I have a setter method which throws an IllegalArgumentException which is of type RuntimeException... It means that I need not declare it in my method declaration, but I should explicity describe in Javadoc.
Is it a good practice to declare it in throws clause just to make it more readable? or is it superfluous and unnecessary because I am going to describe it in Javadoc anyway?
I mean....
  * @throws IllegalArgumentException
public void setterMethod() {
vs
  * @throws IllegalArgumentException
public void setterMethod() throws IllegalArgumentException {
}Thank you,
Srikanth

Answer 1

I have a setter method which throws an
IllegalArgumentException which is of type
RuntimeException... It means that I need not declare
it in my method declaration, but I should explicity
describe in Javadoc.If you conclude that it is important that the other programmers know in which situation your method throws an IllegalArgumentException then go ahead and describe it in javadoc. If you think that it's not important, or it's not necessary, you don't need to describe it. But in general, the unchecked exception IllegalArgumentException, if it is used according to its purposes, deserves a javadoc description. Although I think you are not using this exception appropriately, because your method doesn't even have a parameter! I hope you are showing just an example, just to support your question.
Is it a good practice to declare it in throws clause
just to make it more readable? or is it superfluous
and unnecessary because I am going to describe it in
Javadoc anyway?No! It does not make it more readable. IllegalArgumentException is an unchecked exception, so you have to take advantage of this "uncheackability", that is, the advantage of not being needed to declare that the method throws it. In any case, you shouldn't declare the throws clause for any kind of unchecked exception. A description in javadoc is enough. But I see that you're just saying that the method can throw IllegalArgumentException, in the javadoc. Why don't you give more details? It is a good practice. See below an example:
  * @throws IllegalArgumentException if the parameter name passed is null,
  * or if it is equal to "".
public void setterMethod(String name) {
}