question: public HashMap < String , String > hashMap ( ) { HashMap < String , String > retMap = new HashMap < String , String > ( ) ; for ( String key : properties . keySet ( ) ) { Object value = properties . get ( key ) ; if ( value != null ) { retMap . put ( key , value . toString ( ) ) ; } else { retMap . put ( key , null ) ; } } return retMap ; }
target:  Returns a shallow copy of the underlying map as a HashMap.