我比较了这两个(相似的)例子的字节代码:

我们来看1。例子:

package inside;

public class Test {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        while(true){
            String str = String.valueOf(System.currentTimeMillis());
            System.out.println(str);
        }
    }
}

在javac Test.java, javap -c Test之后，你会得到:

public class inside.Test extends java.lang.Object{
public inside.Test();
  Code:
   0:   aload_0
   1:   invokespecial   #1; //Method java/lang/Object."<init>":()V
   4:   return

public static void main(java.lang.String[]);
  Code:
   0:   invokestatic    #2; //Method java/lang/System.currentTimeMillis:()J
   3:   invokestatic    #3; //Method java/lang/String.valueOf:(J)Ljava/lang/String;
   6:   astore_1
   7:   getstatic       #4; //Field java/lang/System.out:Ljava/io/PrintStream;
   10:  aload_1
   11:  invokevirtual   #5; //Method java/io/PrintStream.println:(Ljava/lang/String;)V
   14:  goto    0

}

让我们看看2。例子:

package outside;

public class Test {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        String str;
        while(true){
            str =  String.valueOf(System.currentTimeMillis());
            System.out.println(str);
        }
    }
}

在javac Test.java, javap -c Test之后，你会得到:

public class outside.Test extends java.lang.Object{
public outside.Test();
  Code:
   0:   aload_0
   1:   invokespecial   #1; //Method java/lang/Object."<init>":()V
   4:   return

public static void main(java.lang.String[]);
  Code:
   0:   invokestatic    #2; //Method java/lang/System.currentTimeMillis:()J
   3:   invokestatic    #3; //Method java/lang/String.valueOf:(J)Ljava/lang/String;
   6:   astore_1
   7:   getstatic       #4; //Field java/lang/System.out:Ljava/io/PrintStream;
   10:  aload_1
   11:  invokevirtual   #5; //Method java/io/PrintStream.println:(Ljava/lang/String;)V
   14:  goto    0

}

观察结果表明，这两个例子没有什么不同。这是JVM规范的结果……

但是为了最佳编码实践的名义，建议在尽可能小的范围内声明变量(在本例中，它是在循环内部，因为这是唯一使用变量的地方)。

在内部，变量可见的范围越小越好。

在循环中声明将限制各自变量的范围。这完全取决于项目对变量范围的要求。

局部变量的作用域应该总是尽可能的小。

在你的例子中，我假设str没有在while循环之外使用，否则你就不会问这个问题，因为在while循环内部声明它不是一个选项，因为它不会编译。

因此，由于str不在循环之外使用，因此str的最小作用域是在while循环内。

因此，答案强调str绝对应该在while循环中声明。没有如果，没有并且，没有但是。

The only case where this rule might be violated is if for some reason it is of vital importance that every clock cycle must be squeezed out of the code, in which case you might want to consider instantiating something in an outer scope and reusing it instead of re-instantiating it on every iteration of an inner scope. However, this does not apply to your example, due to the immutability of strings in java: a new instance of str will always be created in the beginning of your loop and it will have to be thrown away at the end of it, so there is no possibility to optimize there.

编辑:(在答案下面注入我的评论)

In any case, the right way to do things is to write all your code properly, establish a performance requirement for your product, measure your final product against this requirement, and if it does not satisfy it, then go optimize things. And what usually ends up happening is that you find ways to provide some nice and formal algorithmic optimizations in just a couple of places which make our program meet its performance requirements instead of having to go all over your entire code base and tweak and hack things in order to squeeze clock cycles here and there.

如果你的calculateStr()方法返回null，然后你试图在str上调用一个方法，你有NullPointerException的风险。

更一般地说，避免使用空值变量。顺便说一下，它对类属性更强。

这个问题的一个解决方案是提供一个变量作用域来封装while循环:

{
  // all tmp loop variables here ....
  // ....
  String str;
  while(condition){
      str = calculateStr();
      .....
  }
}

当外部作用域结束时，它们将自动取消引用。