Will an element be garbage collected if there is a reference to its field?

Question

I.e., in

class A {
    public String s;
}

and

A a1 = new A();
a1.s = \"bla\";
A a2 = new A();
a2.s = a1.s;
a1 = null;
         


        

Answer 1

Here you are creating two references of Object A like a1 and a2.

First, you are assigning value of a1 to a2.So after setting value to a2, a1 is allowed for GC. But there will be no change in reference a2.

You can also check this blog for Garbage Collection: