 <p>Not exactly what you were asking for but as a Java programmer that spent some time with <a href="http://www.scala.org/" rel="nofollow">Scala</a> I've liked <a href="http://code.google.com/p/guava-libraries/" rel="nofollow">Google Guava</a> implementation of <a href="http://guava-libraries.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/javadoc/com/google/common/base/Optional.html" rel="nofollow">Optional</a> idiom.<br> <a href="http://mail.openjdk.java.net/pipermail/coin-dev/2009-March/000047.html" rel="nofollow">Elvis and Safe Operator Proposal</a> didn't make it into Java 7, maybe for 8. <a href="http://stackoverflow.com/questions/271526/how-to-avoid-null-statements-in-java">This stackoverflow topic</a> may be a interesting read too. </p>