I think in general introducing an alias for a variable is a thing to be avoided. It decreasing readability and introduces the possibility for various errors.  In a shorter method the risk is lower, however.  But it's a pretty ingrained thing in my head, "aliases == more chance for errors." 

If you want the reference specified by a method parameter to be unchangeable, you can make the reference final, say with

```java
public TupleEntryIterator openForRead(FlowProcess<Properties> process, final InputStream input) {
```
However, you do actually want to possible mutate the reference in your code, so you don't actually want this.