Super- first statement in constructor.

Question

my compiler (Jcreator LE) doesn't seem to recognize that super is the first statement in the constructor, and gives me an error message (the same thing happens using the this keyword).
public void Student(String str, int day, int mo, int yr, String maj)
super(str,day,mo,yr);
     major=maj;
     return;
With that code as the constructor, I get this error message
C:\Java\JCreator le\MyProjects\Lab 5\Student.java:8: call to super must be first statement in constructor
          super(str,day,mo,yr);
If anybody has any ideas why this is happening or what I can do to correct it, I would appreciate it.
Thanks,
Gareth

Answer 1

You are trying to call a method.
Instead you have to use super( ) to controll the construction
of a parent class part of an object.
Code is something like this:
class Student {
  public Student(String str) {
     // initialize this object using str
  public Student(int day) {
    // initialize this object using day
class FromStudent extends Student {
    public FromStudent(String str) {
       // pass control to Student constructor
       super(str);  // the first constructor here
    public FromStudent(int day) {
       // pass FromStudent to Student constructor
      super(day);  // the first constructor here