incrementing and decrementing in JAVA

Hey everyone, will i was just reviewing java from the beginning and i came across something that i never understood.
Ok so when you increment something, you use

 
int x=7
x=x++;

and the output is 8.

then why is it that when you do something like this:

int x,y,z;
x=42;
y=x++;
z=++x;

the output is

x=44
y=42
z=44

shouldn't it have been,
x=42
y=43
z=43

why did it skip to 44 instead of 43? and why did it give x the value 44, when i had declared x to be 42?

If someone can please explain how this works.
The same thing happens when you try decrementing it.

int a,b,c;
a=10;
b=a--;
c=--a; 

the output is

1=8
b=10
c=8

instead of a=10, b=9, c=9? like where did the 8 come from and doesn't a=10 and not 8?

thank you for explaining this!

Whoops! mean a=8, not 1=8

mbilal1, on 02 January 2013 - 05:06 PM, said: