design? return output within methods

[jon80]

Do you consider it as good design to return results to the console within the methods, other than for debugging?

public static int factorial (int n)
	{
		if (debug)
		{
			System.out.println("factorial(" + n + "):");
			Throwable t = new Throwable();
			StackTraceElement[] frames = t.getStackTrace();
			for (StackTraceElement f : frames)
				System.out.println(f);
		}
		
		//calculate factorial and display result in console		
		int r;
		if (n <= 1) r = 1;
		else r = n * factorial(n -1);
		[B]System.out.println("return: " + r);[/B]
[B]//I'd rather use the calling application to display the results in real world...[/B]
		return r;
     
	}

[Singing Boyo]

Printing data in methods is not necessarily a bad thing. However, you want (Javadoc) comments with the method stating that it prints data, and possibly even name the method in such a way that it is obvious. As an example you could rename the method factorial to printFactorial(int n)

Many libraries contain debugging methods, and the regular methods do NOT print data. If you are creating a code library, even just for yourself, you will not want methods to print data. However, a method that is used for a program (and only a program) could print data.