if(null check)-else vs try catch(NullPointerException) which is more efficient?

Question

Which of the following three functions is more efficient;

  public String getmConnectedDeviceName1() {
        if(null != mServerDevice) {
            return mServerDevice.getName();
        }
        else {
            return null;
        }
    }

  public String getmConnectedDeviceName2() {
        return mServerDevice == null ? null : mServerDevice.getName();
    }


  public String getmConnectedDeviceName3() {
        try{
            return mServerDevice.getName();
        }
        catch(NullPointerException e) {
            return null;
        }
    }

Please reply with concrete acceptable logic.

Answer 1

The former is much more efficient when mServerDevice is null. When mServerDevice is not null both are about the same. Comparison with null is just comparison of two 32-bit integers which is very fast operation. Throwing an exception is expensive, because new objects ought to be created and stack trace ought to be filled.

Trenary operator ... ? ... : ... is exactly as efficient as if (...) ... else ... statement, because both are translated to the same bytecode.