Java. В чем разница между оператором == и методом euqals()

На одном известном сообществе Java разработчиков задали вопрос "В чем различие между оператором == и методом euqals()"? На этот вопрос я постарался ответить максимально просто с примерами кода

Если вам тоже пока не понятно, тогда этот пример для вас:

String box6;
String box7;

String box1 = new String("Apple");
String box2 = new String("Apple");
   
String box3 = "Apple";
String box4 = "Apple";
String box5 = "apple";        
       
box6 = new String("Orange");
box7 = new String("Orange");
       
System.out.println(box6.equals(box7));            //True       
System.out.println(box6 == box7);                   //False.  box6 and box7 are pointing to two different objects even though both of them share the same string content. It is because of new String() every time a new object is created.
       
       
//        When you call new for box1 and box2, each one gets a new reference that points to the "apple" in the string table. The references are different, but the content is the same.   
System.out.println(box1 == box2);                   //It prints false(reference comparison for two objects)
System.out.println(box1.equals(box2));            //It prints true (content comparison for two Strings)
   
System.out.println(box3 == box4);                   //True. Literals are interned by the compiler and thus refer to the same object
System.out.println(box3 == box2);                   //False. They are not the same object
System.out.println(box3 == box5);                   //False
       
System.out.println(box3.equals(box4));            //True. These two have the same value
System.out.println(box3.equals(box2));            //True
System.out.println(box3.equals(box5));            //String equals method returns false
System.out.println(box3.equalsIgnoreCase(box5)); //String compare while ignoring case,returns true
       
//        The == operator compares the reference value of objects
//        The equals() method present in the java.lang.String class compares the contents of the String object (to another object), does a character-by-character comparison of the contents.