title: Is encapsulating Strings as byte[] in order to save memory overkill ? (Java)
body: <p>Was recently reviewing some Java Swing code and saw this:</p>
  
  <pre><code>byte[] fooReference;
  
  String getFoo() {
     returns new String(fooReference); 
  }
  
  void setFoo(String foo) {
    this.fooReference = foo.getBytes();
  }
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>The above can be useful to save on your memory foot print or so I'm told.  </p>
  
  <p>Is this overkill is anyone else encapsulating their Strings in this way?</p>