Apache commons for readability

There are many short methods in the Apache Commons libraries that seem like overkill at first glance, however, their purpose becomes more apparent when you examine the effect that these methods have on the readability of the caller.

I see a lot of code that does stuff like this:

if( s == null || "".equals(s.trim())) {  
	// Do something  
}  

which could be re-written as

if( StringUtils.isBlank(s)) {  
	// Do something  
}  

Personally, I find it much easier to understand the intent of the second version.

Same goes for [the admittedly poorly named] ‘defaultString’

String result = s1;  
if( s1 == null) {  
	result = s2;  
}  

which could be re-written as

String result = StringUtils.defaultString(s1, s2);  

There’s no need to re-invent the wheel. Many smart people have worked hard to write these methods in an efficient, bug-free way so you might as well leverage all their hard work.

By using the tried-and-true Apache Commons classes where possible your code will be more readable and its intended behaviour will be clearer.