java - Why does the foreach statement not change the element value?

Question

How come the following prints boss and not bass?

String boss = "boss";
char[] array = boss.toCharArray();

for(char c : array)
{
 if (c== 'o')
     c = 'a'; 
}
System.out.println(new String(array)); //How come this does NOT print out bass?It prints boss.

Answer 1

You're changing the iteration variable c. That doesn't change the contents of the array. The iteration variable is just a copy of the array element. If you want to modify the array, you need to do so explicitly:

for (int i = 0; i < array.length; i++) {
    if (array[i] == 'o') {
        array[i] = 'a';
    }
}

Your original code is equivalent (as per section 14.14.2 of the JLS) to:

for (int i = 0; i < array.length; i++) {
    char c = array[i];
    if (c == 'o') {
        c = 'a'; 
    }
}

Changing the value of a local variable will never change anything else - it just changes the local variable. The assignment:

char c = array[i];

copies the value in the array into a local variable. It doesn't associate the local variable with the array element perpetually.