Whether something is a "checked exception" has nothing to do with whether you catch it or what you do in the catch block. It's a property of exception classes. Anything that is a subclass of Throwable except for RuntimeException and its subclasses is a checked exception.

The Java compiler forces you to either catch checked exceptions or declare them in the method signature. It was supposed to improve program safety, but the majority opinion seems to be that it's not worth the design problems it creates.

Why do they let the exception bubble up? Isnt handle error the sooner the better? Why bubble up?

Because that's the entire point of exceptions. Without this possibility, you would not need exceptions. They enable you to handle errors at a level you choose, rather than forcing you to deal with them in low-level methods where they originally occur.

Whether something is a "checked exception" has nothing to do with whether you catch it or what you do in the catch block. It's a property of exception classes. Anything that is a subclass of Exception except for RuntimeException and its subclasses is a checked exception.

The Java compiler forces you to either catch checked exceptions or declare them in the method signature. It was supposed to improve program safety, but the majority opinion seems to be that it's not worth the design problems it creates.

Why do they let the exception bubble up? Isnt handle error the sooner the better? Why bubble up?

Because that's the entire point of exceptions. Without this possibility, you would not need exceptions. They enable you to handle errors at a level you choose, rather than forcing you to deal with them in low-level methods where they originally occur.