Develop Reference

Get the only element in a Set

I need to know the "best" and safest way to get a value held within a Set if there is only one entry. methodToGetValues() is used extensively to read config files and return a list of values given a specific key, in this case "enabled". For the enabled key, there should only be one entry returned in the Set, obviously "true" or "false" but, mistakes happen. I have the following which seems a little convoluted:
Set<String> enabled = methodToGetValues("enabled");
if (!enabled.isEmpty() && enabled.size() < 2 && "true".equals(enabled.iterator().next())) {
...
}
Can anyone suggest a simpler yet still robust way of checking this?

Your question asks to get something from the Set. But your example just needs a check.
If you know what to expect in the Set, this works fine.
if (enabled != null && enabled.size() == 1 && enabled.contains("true")) {
...
}
Otherwise, if you just want to get the element but don't know what it is, the iterator you suggested works fine.
String getOnlyElement(Set<String> enabled, String default) {
return (enabled == null || enabled.size() != 1) ? default : enabled.iterator().next();
}
I like having null checks but it depends on what methodToGetValues returns.

Unsure of what the use case is that would drive using a Set<String> for this data but here is an option:
// check size = 1 over two checks, use contains rather than grabbing an iterator
if (set.size() == 1 && set.contains("true")) {
...
}

public Set<String> getValues(final String key){
.....
}
public String getValue(final String key) {
final Set<String> values = getValues(key);
if (values == null || values.size() != 1) {
throw new IllegalStateException("Invalid configuration for give key :" + key);
}
return values.iterator().next();
}
public Boolean getValueAsBoolean(final String key) {
return Boolean.valueOf(getValue(key));
}
You can modify method to have accept argument to return default value when keys are not found. You can add different methods to return specific type object like inte, boolean, this way code looks cleaner

Get specific objects from ArrayList when objects were added anonymously?

I have created a short example of my problem. I'm creating a list of objects anonymously and adding them to an ArrayList. Once items are in the ArrayList I later come back and add more information to each object within the list. Is there a way to extract a specific object from the list if you do not know its index?
I know only the Object's 'name' but you cannot do a list.get(ObjectName) or anything. What is the recommended way to handle this? I'd rather not have to iterate through the entire list every time I want to retrieve one specific object.
public class TestCode{
public static void main (String args []) {
Cave cave = new Cave();
// Loop adds several Parties to the cave's party list
cave.parties.add(new Party("FirstParty")); // all anonymously added
cave.parties.add(new Party("SecondParty"));
cave.parties.add(new Party("ThirdParty"));
// How do I go about setting the 'index' value of SecondParty for example?
}
}
class Cave {
ArrayList<Party> parties = new ArrayList<Party>();
}
class Party extends CaveElement{
int index;
public Party(String n){
name = n;
}
// getter and setter methods
public String toString () {
return name;
}
}
class CaveElement {
String name = "";
int index = 0;
public String toString () {
return name + "" + index;
}
}

Given the use of List, there's no way to "lookup" a value without iterating through it...
For example...
Cave cave = new Cave();
// Loop adds several Parties to the cave's party list
cave.parties.add(new Party("FirstParty")); // all anonymously added
cave.parties.add(new Party("SecondParty"));
cave.parties.add(new Party("ThirdParty"));
for (Party p : cave.parties) {
if (p.name.equals("SecondParty") {
p.index = ...;
break;
}
}
Now, this will take time. If the element you are looking for is at the end of the list, you will have to iterate to the end of the list before you find a match.
It might be better to use a Map of some kind...
So, if we update Cave to look like...
class Cave {
Map<String, Party> parties = new HashMap<String, Party>(25);
}
We could do something like...
Cave cave = new Cave();
// Loop adds several Parties to the cave's party list
cave.parties.put("FirstParty", new Party("FirstParty")); // all anonymously added
cave.parties.put("SecondParty", new Party("SecondParty"));
cave.parties.put("ThirdParty", new Party("ThirdParty"));
if (cave.parties.containsKey("SecondParty")) {
cave.parties.get("SecondParty").index = ...
}
Instead...
Ultimately, this will all depend on what it is you want to achieve...

List.indexOf() will give you what you want, provided you know precisely what you're after, and provided that the equals() method for Party is well-defined.
Party searchCandidate = new Party("FirstParty");
int index = cave.parties.indexOf(searchCandidate);
This is where it gets interesting - subclasses shouldn't be examining the private properties of their parents, so we'll define equals() in the superclass.
#Override
public boolean equals(Object o) {
if (this == o) {
return true;
}
if (!(o instanceof CaveElement)) {
return false;
}
CaveElement that = (CaveElement) o;
if (index != that.index) {
return false;
}
if (name != null ? !name.equals(that.name) : that.name != null) {
return false;
}
return true;
}
It's also wise to override hashCode if you override equals - the general contract for hashCode mandates that, if x.equals(y), then x.hashCode() == y.hashCode().
#Override
public int hashCode() {
int result = name != null ? name.hashCode() : 0;
result = 31 * result + index;
return result;
}

If you want to lookup objects based on their String name, this is a textbook case for a Map, say a HashMap. You could use a LinkedHashMap and convert it to a List or Array later (Chris has covered this nicely in the comments below).
LinkedHashMap because it lets you access the elements in the order you insert them if you want to do so. Otherwise HashMap or TreeMap will do.
You could get this to work with List as the others are suggesting, but that feels Hacky to me.. and this will be cleaner both in short and long run.
If you MUST use a list for the object, you could still store a Map of the object name to the index in the array. This is a bit uglier, but you get almost the same performance as a plain Map.

You could use list.indexOf(Object) bug in all honesty what you're describing sounds like you'd be better off using a Map.
Try this:
Map<String, Object> mapOfObjects = new HashMap<String, Object>();
mapOfObjects.put("objectName", object);
Then later when you want to retrieve the object, use
mapOfObjects.get("objectName");
Assuming you do know the object's name as you stated, this will be both cleaner and will have faster performance besides, particularly if the map contains large numbers of objects.
If you need the objects in the Map to stay in order, you can use
Map<String, Object> mapOfObjects = new LinkedHashMap<String, Object>();
instead

As per your question requirement , I would like to suggest that Map will solve your problem very efficient and without any hassle.
In Map you can give the name as key and your original object as value.
Map<String,Cave> myMap=new HashMap<String,Cave>();

I would suggest overriding the equals(Object) of your Party class. It might look something like this:
public boolean equals(Object o){
if(o == null)
return false;
if(o instanceof String)
return name.equalsIgnoreCase((String)o);
else if(o instanceof Party)
return equals(((Party)o).name);
return false;
}
After you do that, you could use the indexOf(Object) method to retrieve the index of the party specified by its name, as shown below:
int index = cave.parties.indexOf("SecondParty");
Would return the index of the Party with the name SecondParty.
Note: This only works because you are overriding the equals(Object) method.

You could simply create a method to get the object by it's name.
public Party getPartyByName(String name) {
for(Party party : parties) {
if(name.equalsIgnoreCase(party.name)) {
return party;
}
}
return null;
}

Do I need to implement hashCode() and equals() methods?

If I have a map and an object as map key, are the default hash and equals methods enough?
class EventInfo{
private String name;
private Map<String, Integer> info
}
Then I want to create a map:
Map<EventInfo, String> map = new HashMap<EventInfo, String>();
Do I have to explicitly implement hashCode() and equals()? Thanks.

Yes, you do. HashMaps work by computing the hash code of the key and using that as a base point. If the hashCode function isn't overriden (by you), then it will use the memory address, and equals will be the same as ==.
If you're in Eclipse, it'll generate them for you. Click Source menu → Generate hashCode() and equals().
If you don't have Eclipse, here's some that should work. (I generated these in Eclipse, as described above.)
#Override
public int hashCode() {
final int prime = 31;
int result = 1;
result = prime * result + ((info == null) ? 0 : info.hashCode());
result = prime * result + ((name == null) ? 0 : name.hashCode());
return result;
}
#Override
public boolean equals(Object obj) {
if (this == obj) {
return true;
}
if (obj == null) {
return false;
}
if (!(obj instanceof EventInfo)) {
return false;
}
EventInfo other = (EventInfo) obj;
if (info == null) {
if (other.info != null) {
return false;
}
} else if (!info.equals(other.info)) {
return false;
}
if (name == null) {
if (other.name != null) {
return false;
}
} else if (!name.equals(other.name)) {
return false;
}
return true;
}

Yes, you need them else you won't be able to compare two EventInfo (and your map won't work).

Strictly speaking, no. The default implementations of hashCode() and equals() will produce results that ought to work. See http://docs.oracle.com/javase/6/docs/api/java/lang/Object.html#hashCode()
My understanding is that the default implementation of hashCode() works by taking the object's address in memory and converting to integer, and the default implementation of equals() returns true only if the two objects are actually the same object.
In practice, you could (and should) probably improve on both of those implementations. For example, both methods should ignore object members that aren't important. In addition, equals() might want to recursively compare references in the object.
In your particular case, you might define equals() as true if the two objects refer to the same string or the two strings are equal and the two maps are the same or they are equal. I think WChargin gave you pretty good implementations.

Depends on what you want to happen. If two different EventInfo instances with the same name and info should result in two different keys, then you don't need to implement equals and hashCode.
So
EventInfo info1 = new EventInfo();
info1.setName("myname");
info1.setInfo(null);
EventInfo info2 = new EventInfo();
info2.setName("myname");
info2.setInfo(null);
info1.equals(info2) would return false and info1.hashCode() would return a different value to info2.hashCode().
Therefore, when you are adding them to your map:
map.put(info1, "test1");
map.put(info2, "test2");
you would have two different entries.
Now, that may be desired behaviour. For example, if your EventInfo is collecting different events, two distinct events with the same data may well want to be desired to be two different entries.
The equals and hashCode contracts is also applicable in a Set.
So for example, if your event info contains mouse clicks, it may well be desired that you would want to end up with:
Set<EventInfo> collectedEvents = new HashSet<EventInfo>();
collectedEvents.add(info1);
collectedEvents.add(info2);
2 collected events instead of just 1...
Hope I'm making sense here...
EDIT:
If however, the above set and map should only contain a single entry, then you could use apache commons EqualsBuilder and HashCodeBuilder to simplify the implementation of equals and hashCode:
#Override
public boolean equals(Object obj) {
if (obj instanceof EventInfo) {
EventInfo other = (EventInfo) obj;
EqualsBuilder builder = new EqualsBuilder();
builder.append(name, other.name);
builder.append(info, other.info);
return builder.isEquals();
}
return false;
}
#Override
public int hashCode() {
HashCodeBuilder builder = new HashCodeBuilder();
builder.append(name);
builder.append(info);
return builder.toHashCode();
}
EDIT2:
It could also be appropriate if two EventInfo instances are considered the same, if they have the same name, for example if the name is some unique identifier (I know it's a bit far fetched with your specific object, but I'm generalising here...)

Java HashMap.containsKey() doesn't call equals()

I have a hashmap:
Map<LotWaferBean, File> hm = new HashMap<LotWaferBean, File>();
LotWaferBean lw = new LotWaferBean();
... //populate lw
if (!hm.containsKey((LotWaferBean) lw)) {
hm.put(lw, triggerFiles[l]);
}
The code for LotWaferBean:
#Override
public boolean equals(Object o) {
if (!(o instanceof LotWaferBean)) {
return false;
}
if (((LotWaferBean) o).getLotId().equals(lotId)
&& ((LotWaferBean) o).getWaferNo() == waferNo) {
return true;
}
return false;
}
In my IDE I put breakpoints in equals() but it is never executed. Why?

Try putting a breakpoint in hashCode().
If the hashCode() of two objects in a map return the same number, then equals will be called to determine if they're really equal.

JVM checks the hashcode bucket of that object's hashcode, if there are more objects with the same hashcode, then only, the equals() method will be executed. And, the developer should follow correct contract between the hashCode() and equals() methods.

Only if 2 hashCodes equal, equals() will be called during loop keys.

Only if 2 hashCodes equal, equals() will be called during loop keys.
this is the correct answer... or almost. Precisely, if 2 hash codes collide (being the same ensures they are bound to collide under proper hashmap impl), only then equality check is performed.

BTW, your equal method is most likely incorrect. In case LotWaferBean is overridden, your equals method will accept the subclass instance, but will your subclass also do?
It better should read:
#Override
public boolean equals(Object o) {
if (o == null || o.getClass() != getClass()) { // << this is important
return false;
}
final LotWaferBean other = (LotWaferBean)o;
return other.getLotId().equals(lotId)
&& other.getWaferNo() == waferNo);
}

As Abimaran Kugathasan noted, the HashMap implementation uses hash-buckets to efficiently look up keys, and only uses equals() to compare the keys in the matching hash-bucket against the given key. It's worth noting that keys are assigned to hash-buckets when they are added to a HashMap. If you alter keys in a HashMap after adding them, in a way that would change their hash code, then they won't be in the proper hash-bucket; and trying to use a matching key to access the map will find the proper hash-bucket, but it won't contain the altered key.
class aMutableType {
private int value;
public aMutableType(int originalValue) {
this.value = originalValue;
}
public int getValue() {
return this.value;
}
public void setValue(int newValue) {
this.value = newValue;
}
#Override
public boolean equals(Object o) {
// ... all the normal tests ...
return this.value == ((aMutableType) o).value;
}
#Override
public int hashCode() {
return Integer.hashCode(this.value);
}
}
...
Map<aMutableType, Integer> aMap = new HashMap<>();
aMap.put(new aMutableType(5), 3); // puts key in bucket for hash(5)
for (aMutableType key : new HashSet<>(aMap.keySet()))
key.setValue(key.getValue()+1); // key 5 => 6
if (aMap.containsKey(new aMutableType(6))
doSomething(); // won't get here, even though
// there's a key == 6 in the Map,
// because that key is in the hash-bucket for 5
This can result in some pretty odd-looking behavior. You can set a breakpoint just before theMap.containsKey(theKey), and see that the value of theKey matches a key in theMap, and yet the key's equals() won't be called, and containsKey() will return false.
As noted here https://stackoverflow.com/a/21601013 , there's actually a warning the JavaDoc for Map regarding the use of mutable types for keys. Non-hash Map types won't have this particular problem, but could have other problems when keys are altered in-place.

Strange Java HashMap behavior - can't find matching object

I've been encountering some strange behavior when trying to find a key inside a java.util.HashMap, and I guess I'm missing something. The code segment is basically:
HashMap<Key, Value> data = ...
Key k1 = ...
Value v = data.get(k1);
boolean bool1 = data.containsKey(k1);
for (Key k2 : data.keySet()) {
boolean bool2 = k1.equals(k2);
boolean bool3 = k2.equals(k1);
boolean bool4 = k1.hashCode() == k2.hashCode();
break;
}
That strange for loop is there because for a specific execution I happen to know that data contains only one item at this point and it is k1, and indeed bool2, bool3 and bool4 will be evaluated to true in that execution. bool1, however, will be evaluated to false, and v will be null.
Now, this is part of a bigger program - I could not reproduce the error on a smaller sample - but still it seems to me that no matter what the rest of the program does, this behavior should never happen.
EDIT: I have manually verified that the hash code does not change between the time the object was inserted to the map and the time it was queried. I'll keep checking this venue, but is there any other option?

This behavior could happen if the hash code of the key were changed after it was inserted in to the map.
Here's an example with the behavior you described:
public class Key
{
int hashCode = 0;
#Override
public int hashCode() {
return hashCode;
}
#Override
public boolean equals(Object obj) {
if (this == obj)
return true;
if (obj == null)
return false;
if (getClass() != obj.getClass())
return false;
Key other = (Key) obj;
return hashCode == other.hashCode;
}
public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
HashMap<Key, Integer> data = new HashMap<Key, Integer>();
Key k1 = new Key();
data.put(k1, 1);
k1.hashCode = 1;
boolean bool1 = data.containsKey(k1);
for (Key k2 : data.keySet()) {
boolean bool2 = k1.equals(k2);
boolean bool3 = k2.equals(k1);
boolean bool4 = k1.hashCode() == k2.hashCode();
System.out.println("bool1: " + bool1);
System.out.println("bool2: " + bool2);
System.out.println("bool3: " + bool3);
System.out.println("bool4: " + bool4);
break;
}
}
}

From the API description of the Map interface:
Note: great care must be exercised if
mutable objects are used as map keys.
The behavior of a map is not specified
if the value of an object is changed
in a manner that affects equals
comparisons while the object is a key
in the map. A special case of this
prohibition is that it is not
permissible for a map to contain
itself as a key. While it is
permissible for a map to contain
itself as a value, extreme caution is
advised: the equals and hashCode
methods are no longer well defined on
such a map.
Also, there are very specific requirements on the behavior of equals() and hashCode() for types used as Map keys. Failure to follow the rules here will result in all sorts of undefined behavior.

If you're certain the hash code does not change between the time the key is inserted and the time you do the contains check, then there is something seriously wrong somewhere. Are you sure you're using a java.util.HashMap and not a subclass of some sort? Do you know what implementation of the JVM you are using?
Here's the source code for java.util.HashMap.getEntry(Object key) from Sun's 1.6.0_20 JVM:
final Entry<K,V> getEntry(Object key) {
int hash = (key == null) ? 0 : hash(key.hashCode());
for (Entry<K,V> e = table[indexFor(hash, table.length)];
e != null;
e = e.next) {
Object k;
if (e.hash == hash &&
((k = e.key) == key || (key != null && key.equals(k))))
return e;
}
return null;
As you can see, it retrieves the hashCode, goes to the corresponding slot in the table, then does an equals check on each element in that slot. If this is the code you're running and the hash code of the key has not changed, then it must be doing an equals check which must be failing.
The next step would be for you to give us some more code or context - the hashCode and equals methods of your Key class at a minimum.
Alternatively, I would recommend hooking up to a debugger if you can. Watch what bucket your key is hashed to, and step through the containsKey check to see where it's failing.

Is this application multi-threaded? If so, another thread could change the data between the data.containsKey(k1) call and the data.keySet() call.

If equals() returns true for two objects, then hashCode() should return the same value. If equals() returns false, then hashCode() should return different values.
For Reference:
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/java/library/j-jtp05273.html

Perhaps the Key class looks like
Key
{
boolean equals = false ;
public boolean equals ( Object oth )
{
try
{
return ( equals ) ;
}
finally
{
equals = true ;
}
}
}