This is a welcome addition to java but I wish they had chosen a slightly different syntax. My main gripe is that its not clear what the lexical scoping rules ar

This is a welcome addition to java but I wish they had chosen a slightly different syntax. My main gripe is that its not clear what the lexical scoping rules are. Most likely the variable declared in the try is only available in the body of the try, not in the catch but its an extra thing to know. As opposed to InputStream in; try(in = new FileInputStream()){ ... } catch (...){ ... } Now there are no new lexical scoping rules to understand. A lesser point is that I find the try(x = e) syntax ugly. It reminds me of the C-ism where a variable is set and tested in an if statement. if (x = getline()){ ... } Control flow and side effects should not be mixed, IMO.