I started studying the linked lists and saw a code snippet that looks like this:

public class LinkedList {
    Node head;
    class Node {
        int data;
        Node next;

        Node(int d) {data = d;}
    }
    
    private void append(int newData) { 
        Node newNode = new Node(newData);

        if (head == null) {
            head = newNode;
            return;
        }

        Node last = head;
        while (last.next != null) {
            last = last.next;
        }

        newNode.next = null;
        last.next = newNode;
    }
}

My question is if the newNode.next = null; line is really necessary or if it's just a good practice because in the Node newNode = new Node(newData); line after allocating the node and putting the data, newNode.next will be null.

CodePudding user response：

Setting newnode.next = null is not required, and you are correct that it should already be null after instantiation.