What is Object Cloning?

In Java, object cloning is the process of creating an exact copy of an object. There are two types of object cloning: a deep copy and a shallow copy.

A deep copy of an object creates a new object with a new memory address and copies all the fields of the original object to the new object. The new object is completely independent of the original object, meaning that any changes made to the new object do not affect the original object.

A shallow copy of an object, on the other hand, creates a new object with a new memory address, but it only copies the references to the fields of the original object. This means that the new object is dependent on the original object, because if the original object is changed, the changes will be reflected in the new object as well.

To create a deep copy of an object in Java, you can use the Object.clone() method or implement the Cloneable interface and override the clone() method.