Hi peter
Data is an array of byte not a class!
Good syntax: byte data[]=new byte[100];
Second:if data can't be a class it can't have a method like startsWith().
Regards Max_X_Meridio

I would prefer
byte[] data=new byte[100];

Looks like you are thinking perl;

my @data;
$#data = 99;

if (@data[0 .. 2] == (12,43,32)){

Nothing to stop you writing:

    public static boolean startsWith(byte[] target, byte... start) {
        int num = start.length;
        if (target.length < num) {
            return false;
        }
        for (int ct=0; ct<num; ++ct) {
            if (target[ct] != start[ct]) {
                return false;
            }
        }
        return true;
    }

Tom Hawtin

// see http://mindprod.com/jgloss/naming.html why data is not a good
// name

byte temperatures = new byte[ 100 ];

// ... code to set temperatures

if ( temperatures[0] == 12  

you could write a static method boolean  startsWith( byte[], byte[] )
or startsWith( byte[], byte... );

then you could write:

if ( startsWith( temperatures, new byte[]{ 12, 43, 32 } ) ) ...

Not as tidy as you wanted but Java was never big on terseness.