What does it mean: The serializable class does not declare a static final serialVersionUID field?

Question

I have the warning message given in the title. I would like to understand and remove it. I found already some answers on this question but I do not understand these answers because of an overload with technical terms. Is it possible to explain this issue with simple words?

P.S. I know what OOP is. I know what is object, class, method, field and instantiation.

P.P.S. If somebody needs my code it is here:

import java.awt.*;
import javax.swing.*;


public class HelloWorldSwing extends JFrame {

        JTextArea m_resultArea = new JTextArea(6, 30);

        //====================================================== constructor
        public HelloWorldSwing() {
            //... Set initial text, scrolling, and border.
            m_resultArea.setText("Enter more text to see scrollbars");
            JScrollPane scrollingArea = new JScrollPane(m_resultArea);
            scrollingArea.setBorder(BorderFactory.createEmptyBorder(10,5,10,5));

            // Get the content pane, set layout, add to center
            Container content = this.getContentPane();
            content.setLayout(new BorderLayout());
            content.add(scrollingArea, BorderLayout.CENTER);
            this.pack();
        }

        public static void createAndViewJFrame() {
            JFrame win = new HelloWorldSwing();
            win.setTitle("TextAreaDemo");
            win.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
            win.setVisible(true);
        }

        //============================================================= main
        public static void main(String[] args) {
            SwingUtilities.invokeLater(new Runnable(){
                public void run(){
                    createAndViewJFrame();
                }
            });
        }

}

Answer 1

From the javadoc:

The serialization runtime associates with each serializable class a version number, called a serialVersionUID, which is used during deserialization to verify that the sender and receiver of a serialized object have loaded classes for that object that are compatible with respect to serialization. If the receiver has loaded a class for the object that has a different serialVersionUID than that of the corresponding sender's class, then deserialization will result in an InvalidClassException. A serializable class can declare its own serialVersionUID explicitly by declaring a field named "serialVersionUID" that must be static, final, and of type long:

You can configure your IDE to:

• ignore this, instead of giving a warning.
• autogenerate an id

As per your additional question "Can it be that the discussed warning message is a reason why my GUI application freeze?":

No, it can't be. It can cause a problem only if you are serializing objects and deserializing them in a different place (or time) where (when) the class has changed, and it will not result in freezing, but in InvalidClassException.

Answer 2

The other answers so far have a lot of technical information. I will try to answer, as requested, in simple terms.

Serialization is what you do to an instance of an object if you want to dump it to a raw buffer, save it to disk, transport it in a binary stream (e.g., sending an object over a network socket), or otherwise create a serialized binary representation of an object. (For more info on serialization see Java Serialization on Wikipedia).

If you have no intention of serializing your class, you can add the annotation just above your class @SuppressWarnings("serial").

If you are going to serialize, then you have a host of things to worry about all centered around the proper use of UUID. Basically, the UUID is a way to "version" an object you would serialize so that whatever process is de-serializing knows that it's de-serializing properly. I would look at Ensure proper version control for serialized objects for more information.

Answer 3

The reasons for warning are documented here, and the simple fixes are to turn off the warning or put the following declaration in your code to supply the version UID. The actual value is not relevant, start with 999 if you like, but changing it when you make incompatible changes to the class is.

public class HelloWorldSwing extends JFrame {

        JTextArea m_resultArea = new JTextArea(6, 30);
        private static final long serialVersionUID = 1L;

Answer 4

it must be changed whenever anything changes that affects the serialization (additional fields, removed fields, change of field order, ...)

That's not correct, and you will be unable to cite an authoriitative source for that claim. It should be changed whenever you make a change that is incompatible under the rules given in the Versioning of Serializable Objects section of the Object Serialization Specification, which specifically does not include additional fields or change of field order, and when you haven't provided readObject(), writeObject(), and/or readResolve() or /writeReplace() methods and/or a serializableFields declaration that could cope with the change.

Answer 5

Any class that can be serialized (i.e. implements Serializable) should declare that UID and it must be changed whenever anything changes that affects the serialization (additional fields, removed fields, change of field order, ...). The field's value is checked during deserialization and if the value of the serialized object does not equal the value of the class in the current VM, an exception is thrown.

Note that this value is special in that it is serialized with the object even though it is static, for the reasons described above.