Thread: I'm tearing my hair out, I need help

 
Scanner input = new Scanner(System.in);
 
		System.out.print("Is your pet a dog or a cat?: ");
		String customerInput = input.next();
 
		System.out.print(customerInput);
 
		if (customerInput != "dog" && customerInput != "cat"){
			System.out.println();
			System.out.println("Incorrect input please enter again!\n\n");
			System.out.print("Is your pet a dog or a cat?: ");
			customerInput = input.next();
		}
		else {
			System.out.print(customerInput);
		}
		input.close();

why is dog or cat triggering the first if statement? Makes no sense. I even took out the && and other condition and dog still triggers it. I even printed it out to screen and it's dog. What am I missing here? I'm trying to do a project for school and several lines of my code are being skipped and I can only assume it's the scanner method.

--- Update ---

Wow so apparently the operators are shit in java when it comes to strings because the only one that works is the String method of equals.

You need to use methods when comparing the contents of objects. The arithmetic operators are for primitives.
The logical operators work with boolean values.
Take a look at the tutorial: https://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutor...operators.html

Please edit your post and wrap your code with code tags:

[code]
**YOUR CODE GOES HERE**
[/code]

to get highlighting and preserve formatting.

Apparently the scanner gets lost when you open and close it and try to open it again

Are you talking about when Scanner uses System.in? When System.in is closed, it stays closed.