Using C style macros in Java

It's possible to use C style macros in Java source files.

The shouldn't part

You shouldn't because using the pre-processor is considered bad practice and the need for it has vanished in modern languages.

The can part

Java itself doesn't support macros. On the other hand, you could pipe the source code through the C preprocessor (CPP for short) just like the C/C++ compile chain does.

Here's a demo:

#define cube(x) ((x)*(x)*(x))
class Test {
    public static void main(String[] ags) {
        System.out.println(cube(5));
    }
}

Run the cpp command as follows:

$ cpp -P src/Test.java preprocessed/Test.java

Result looks as follows:

class Test {
    public static void main(String[] ags) {
        System.out.println(((5)*(5)*(5)));
    }
}

Compile and run as usual

$ javac -d bin preprocessed/Test.java
$ java -cp bin Test
125

Integrating the cpp step in gradle, ant, maven or in the build chain of your favorite IDE should be straight forward.

A better workaround

You can write a utility class with a static method instead:

package util;
public class MathUtil {
    public static int cube(int i) {
        return i*i*i;
    }
}

To keep invocations as terse as for a macro, you can statically import the method as follows:

import static util.MathUtil.cube; 
class Test {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        System.out.println(cube(5));
    }
}

And finally, an anecdote

I myself used the CPP preprocessing approach on a Java code base once. I was creating a programming assignment for a course. I wanted to be able to easily extract a code skeleton out of the reference solution. So I just used a few #ifdefs to filter out the "secret" parts of the solution. That way I could maintain the reference solution, and easily regenerate the code skeleton.