RFR 4358774: Add null InputStream and OutputStream

[Brian Burkhalter]

The name “emptyStream()” was considered for InputStream and “discardingStream()” for OutputStream. It was thought that “null” or “empty” would be more likely to be found by developers due to familiarity. FWIW there is precedent in third party libraries for the “null” names.

Brian

On Dec 6, 2017, at 11:11 AM, Jonathan Gibbons <jonathan.gibbons at oracle.com> wrote:

> "null" is a significant term in the Java ecosystem, and the relationship here, to /dev/null or NUL seems somewhat tenuous.
> 
> Have any other names been considered?  At least for the InputStream, calling it an "empty stream" seems more intuitive than a "null stream".