Realistic use case for static factory method?

Question

I\'m familiar with the idea and benefits of a static factory method, as described in Joshua Bloch\'s Effective Java:

• Factory methods have names, so you can have mo

Answer 1

Use javax.swing.BorderFactory as an example of all three points.

This class is used to make borders for swing objects. These border objects can be easily re-used, and this factory method allows for this. Here is the javadoc. This factory is a great example of all three points:

• There are multiple static methods with different names like createEmptyBorder() and createEtchedBorder().
• These methods will return previously created objects when possible. It's quite frequent that the same border would be used throughout an application.
• Border itself is actually an interface, so all objects created through this factory are actually classes which implement this interface.