Preserving parameter/argument names in compiled Java classes

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To preserve names in the class file for debugging purposes try project properties, Java compiler, then “Add variable attributes to generated class files” (See Eclipse Help).

Compiling the following source:

public class StackOverflowTest {
    public void test(String foo, String bar) {
        // blah
    }
}

Is decompiled into:

// Compiled from StackOverflowTest.java (version 1.5 : 49.0, super bit)
public class StackOverflowTest {

    // Method descriptor #6 ()V
    // Stack: 1, Locals: 1
    public StackOverflowTest();
        0  aload_0 [this]
        1  invokespecial java.lang.Object() [8]
        4  return
        Line numbers:
            [pc: 0, line: 1]
        Local variable table:
            [pc: 0, pc: 5] local: this index: 0 type: StackOverflowTest

    // Method descriptor #15 (Ljava/lang/String;Ljava/lang/String;)V
    // Stack: 0, Locals: 3
    public void test(java.lang.String foo, java.lang.String bar);
        0  return
        Line numbers:
            [pc: 0, line: 4]
        Local variable table:
            [pc: 0, pc: 1] local: this index: 0 type: StackOverflowTest
            [pc: 0, pc: 1] local: foo index: 1 type: java.lang.String
            [pc: 0, pc: 1] local: bar index: 2 type: java.lang.String
}

See the parameter names are preserved in the class files.

I would suggest you look into how your source is being compiled, which version it is compiled for etc.

EDIT:

Ah, I see this is different for interfaces – they don’t seem to have this information available for the debugger which I guess makes sense. I don’t think there’ll be a way round this, if you just want to see the parameter names when you’re editing source you’ll need to go the javadoc route as Nagrom_17 suggests (attach the source).

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