try-with-resources, introduced from Java SE 7

The try-with-resources statement is a try statement that declares one or more resources. A resource is as an object that must be closed after the program is finished with it. The try-with-resources statement ensures that each resource is closed at the end of the statement. Any object that implements java.lang.AutoCloseable, which includes all objects which implement java.io.Closeable, can be used as a resource.

The following example reads the first line from a file. It uses an instance of BufferedReader to read data from the file. BufferedReader is a resource that must be closed after the program is finished with it:

 static String readFirstLineFromFile(String path) throws IOException {
  try (BufferedReader br = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(path))) {
   return br.readLine();
  }
 }

Prior to Java SE 7, you can use a finally block to ensure that a resource is closed regardless of whether the try statement completes normally or abruptly. The following example uses a finally block instead of a try-with-resources statement:

 static String readFirstLineFromFileWithFinallyBlock(String path) throws IOException {
  BufferedReader br = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(path));
  try {
   return br.readLine();
  } finally {
   if (br != null) br.close();
  }
 }

reference: http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/technotes/guides/language/try-with-resources.html