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Java in Android Studio: Weirdness when writing value into array of user defined class

I am writing my first app in Android Studio, I am a self-taught novice. When I write data into the subscript of an array I have created as a user-defined class the value is written into an adjacent subscript as well! Have traced to some code where I move data down one position in the array, thought I could do this in one operation, but it seems this messes something up and I need to copy each member of the class individually.
Here is my class
class LeaderboardClass
{
public String DateTime;
public String UserName;
public long Milliseconds; //0 denotes not in use
}
Here is my array declaration
LeaderboardClass[] LeaderboardData = new LeaderboardClass[LeaderboardEntries];
I want to move some data from subscript j to subscript j+1
I tried
LeaderboardData[j + 1] = LeaderboardData[j];
I thought this would copy all the data from subscript j to j+1
Then when I subsequently write to the array I (subscript i) I get the correct entry I made, plus a duplicate entry in the adjacent subscript i+1.
When I rewrite the above to:
LeaderboardData[j + 1].UserName = LeaderboardData[j].UserName;
LeaderboardData[j + 1].DateTime = LeaderboardData[j].DateTime;
LeaderboardData[j + 1].Milliseconds = LeaderboardData[j].Milliseconds;
Everything else behaves as expected. So I was wondering exactly what is happening with my first (presumably incorrect) code?
Thanks.

In Java, there's a difference between primitive values and objects (instances of classes): Primitives are stored by value whereas objects are stored by reference. This means that your code would work as you expect if you were using integers. However, since you are using a class, the array merely stores the references to those objects. Hence, when you do LeaderboardData[j + 1] = LeaderboardData[j]; you are merely copying the reference of that object. Therefore, LeaderboardData[j + 1]and LeaderboardData[j] will point to the same object.
Sidenote: If you run your program with a debugger, you can actually see this in action:
The number behind the # denotes the reference number and if you look closely, you can see that the objects at indices 8 and 9 both have the reference #716.
To fix this, I would suggest that you use lists instead of arrays as they allow you to remove and add new entries. The standard list implementation is an ArrayList but in your use-case, a LinkedList might be more efficient.
Lastly, a closing notes on your code: For variable names (like DateTime, UserName or LeaderboardData should always start with a lowercase letter to distinguish them from classes. That way, you can avoid lots of confusion - especially because Java also has a built-in class called DateTime.

Implementing a very efficient bit structure

I'm looking for a solution in pesudo code or java or js for the following problem:
We need to implement an efficient bit structure to hold data for N bits (you could think of the bits as booleans as well, on/off).
We need to support the following methods:
init(n)
get(index)
set(index, True/False)
setAll(True/false)
Now I got to a solution with o(1) in all except for init that is o(n). The idea was to create an array where each index saves value for a bit. In order to support the setAll I would also save a timestamp withe the bit vapue to know if to take the value from tge array or from tge last setAll value. The o(n) in init is because we need to go through the array to nullify it, otherwise it will have garbage which can be ANYTHING. Now I was asked to find a solution where the init is also o(1) (we can create an array, but we cant clear the garbage, the garbage might even look like valid data which is wrong and make the solution bad, we need a solution that works 100%).
Update:
This is an algorithmic qiestion and not a language specific one. I encountered it in an interview question. Also using an integer to represent the bit array is not good enough because of memory limits. I was tipped that it has something to do with some kind of smart handling of garbage data in the array without ckeaning it in the init, using some kind of mechanism to not fall because if the garbage data in the array (but I'm not sure how).

Make lazy data structure based on hashmap (while hashmap sometimes might have worse access time than o(1)) with 32-bit values (8,16,64 ints are suitable too) for storage and auxiliary field InitFlag
To clear all, make empty map with InitFlag = 0 (deleting old map is GC's work in Java, isn't it?)
To set all, make empty map with InitFlag = 1
When changing some bit, check whether corresponding int key bitnum/32 exists. If yes, just change bitnum&32 bit, if not and bit value differs from InitFlag - create key with value based on InitFlag (all zeros or all ones) and change needed bit.
When retrieving some bit, check whether corresponding key exists. If yes, extract bit, if not - get InitFlag value
SetAll(0): ifl = 0, map - {}
SetBit(35): ifl = 0, map - {1 : 0x10}
SetBit(32): ifl = 0, map - {1 : 0x12}
ClearBit(32): ifl = 0, map - {1 : 0x10}
ClearBit(1): do nothing, ifl = 0, map - {1 : 0x10}
GetBit(1): key=0 doesn't exist, return ifl=0
GetBit(35): key=1 exists, return map[1]>>3 =1
SetAll(1): ifl = 1, map = {}
SetBit(35): do nothing
ClearBit(35): ifl = 1, map - {1 : 0xFFFFFFF7 = 0b...11110111}
and so on

If this is a college/high-school computer science test or homework assignment question - I suspect they are trying to get you to use BOOLEAN BIT-WISE LOGIC - specifically, saving the bit inside of an int or a long. I suspect (but I'm not a mind-reader - and I could be wrong!) that using "Arrays" is exactly what your teacher would want you to avoid.
For instance - this quote is copied from Google's Search Reults:
long: The long data type is a 64-bit two's complement integer. The
signed long has a minimum value of -263 and a maximum value of 263-1.
In Java SE 8 and later, you can use the long data type to represent an
unsigned 64-bit long, which has a minimum value of 0 and a maximum
value of 264-1
What that means is that a single long variable in Java could store 64 of your bit-wise values:
long storage;
// To get the first bit-value, use logical-or ('|') and get the bit.
boolean result1 = (boolean) storage | 0b00000001; // Gets the first bit in 'storage'
boolean result2 = (boolean) storage | 0b00000010; // Gets the second
boolean result3 = (boolean) storage | 0b00000100; // Gets the third
...
boolean result8 = (boolean) storage | 0b10000000; // Gets the eighth result.
I could write the entire thing for you, but I'm not 100% sure of your actual specifications - if you use a long, you can only store 64 separate binary values. If you want an arbitrary number of values, you would have to use as many 'long' as you need.
Here is a SO posts about binary / boolean values:
Binary representation in Java
Here is a SO post about bit-shifting:
Java - Circular shift using bitwise operations
Again, it would be a job, and I'm not going to write the entire project. However, the get(int index) and set(int index, boolean val) methods would involve bit-wise shifting of the number 1.
int pos = 1;
pos = pos << 5; // This would function as a 'pointer' to the fifth element of the binary number list.
storage | pos; // This retrieves the value stored as position 5.

Parsing a string into different variable types

Relatively new to programming here so I apologize if this is rather basic.
I am trying to convert string lines into actual variables of different types.
My input is a file in the following format:
double d1, d2 = 3.14, d3;
int a, b = 17, c, g;
global int gInt = 1;
final int fInt = 2;
String s1, s2 = "Still with me?", s3;
These lines are all strings at this point. I wish to extract the variables from the strings and receive the actual variables so I can use and manipulate them.
So far I've tried using regex but I'm stumbling here. Would love some direction as to how this is possible.
I thought of making a general type format for example:
public class IntType{
boolean finalFlag;
boolean globalFlag;
String variableName;
IntType(String variableName, boolean finalFlag, boolean globalFlag){
this.finalflag = finalFlag;
this.globalFlag = globalFlag;
this.variableName = variableName;
}
}
Creating a new wrapper for each of the variable types.
By using and manipulating I would like to then compare between the wrappers I've created and check for duplicate declarations etc'.
But I don't know if I'm on the right path.
Note: Disregard bad format (i.e. no ";" at the end and so on)

While others said that this is not possible, it actually is. However it goes somewhat deep into Java. Just search for java dynamic classloading. For example here:
Method to dynamically load java class files
It allows you do dynamically load a java file at runtime. However your current input does not look like a java file but it can easily be converted to one by wrapping it with a small wrapper class like:
public class CodeWrapper() {
// Insert code from file here
}
You can do this with easy file or text manipulations before loading the ressource as class.
After you have loaded the class you can access its variables via reflection, for example by
Field[] fields = myClassObject.getClass().getFields();
This allows you to access the visibility modifier, the type of the variable, the name, the content and more.
Of course this approach presumes that your code actually is valid java code.
If it is not and you are trying to confirm if it is, you can try to load it. If it fails, it was non-valid.

I have no experience with Java, but as far as my knowledge serves me, it is not possible to actually create variables using a file in any language. You'll want to create some sort of list object which can hold a variable amount of items of a certain type. Then you can read the values from a file, parse them to the type you want it to be, and then save it to the list of the corresponding type.
EDIT:
If I were you, I would change my file layout if possible. It would then look something like this:
1 2 3 4 //1 int, 2 floats, 3 booleans and 4 strings
53
3.14
2.8272
true
false
false
#etc.
In pseudo code, you would then read it as follows:
string[] input = file.Readline().split(' '); // Read the first line and split on the space character
int[] integers = new int[int.Parse(input[0])] // initialise an array with specefied elements
// Make an array for floats and booleans and strings the same way
while(not file.eof) // While you have not reached the end of the file
{
integers.insert(int.Parse(file.ReadLine())) // parse your values according to the size which was given on the first line of the file
}
If you can not change the file layout, then you'll have to do some smart string splitting to extract the values from the file and then create some sort of dynamic array which resizes as you add more values to it.
MORE EDITS:
Based on your comment:
You'll want to split on the '=' character first. From the first half of the split, you'll want to search for a type and from the second half, you can split again on the ',' to find all the values.

The difference between arrays in Java and C

In my book there is an example which explains the differences between arrays in Java and C.
In Java we can create an array by writing:
int[] a = new int[5];
This just allocates storage space on the stack for five integers and we can access them exactly as we would have done in Java
int a[5] = {0};
int i;
for (i = 0, i < 5; i++){
printf("%2d: %7d\n", i, a[i]);
}
Then the author says the following
Of course our program should not use a number 5 as we did on several places in the example, instead we use a constant. We can use the C preprocessor to do this:
#define SIZE 5
What are advantages of defining a constant SIZE 5?

Using a named constant is generally considered good practice because if it is used in multiple places, you only need to change the definition to change the value, rather than change every occurrence - which is error prone.
For example, as mentioned by stark in the comments, it is likely that you'll want to loop over an array. If the size of the array is defined by a named constant called SIZE, then you can use that in the loop bounds. Changing the size of the array then only requires changing the definition of SIZE.
There is also the question of whether #define is really the right solution.
To borrow another comment, from Jonathan Leffer: see static const vs #define vs enum for a discussion of different ways of naming constants. While modern C does allow using a variable as an array size specifier, this technically results in a variable-length array which may incur a small overhead.

You should use a constant, because embedding magic numbers in code makes it harder to read and maintain. For instance, if you see 52 in some code, you don't know what it is. However, if you write #define DECKSIZE 52, then whenever you see DECKSIZE, you know exactly what it means. In addition, if you want to change the deck size, say 36 for durak, you could simply change one line, instead of changing every instance throughout the code base.

Well, imagine that you create a static array of 5 integer just like you did int my_arr [5]; ,you code a whole programm with it, but.. suddenly you realise that maybe you need more space. Imagine that you wrote a code of 6-700 lines, you MUST replace every occurence of you array with the fixed number of your choice. Every for loop, and everything that is related with the size of this array. You can avoid all of this using the preprocessor command #define which will replace every occurence of a "keyword" with the content you want, it's like a synonymous for something. Eg: #define SIZE 5 will replace in your code every occurence of the word SIZE with the value 5.

I find comments here to be superflous. As long as you use your constant (5 in this case) only once, it doesn't matter where it is. Moreover, having it in place improves readability. And you certainly do not need to use the constant in more than one place - afterall, you should infer the size of array through sizeof operator anyways. The benefit of sizeof approach is that it works seamlessly with VLAs.
The drawback of global #define (or any other global name) is that it pollutes global namespace. One should understand that global names is a resource to be used conservatively.

#define SIZE 5
This looks like an old outdated way of declaring constants in C code that was popular in dinosaur era. I suppose some lovers of this style are still alive.
The preferred way to declare constants in C languages nowadays is:
const int kSize = 5;

How to convert array of floats to array of doubles in Java?

I have an array of floats and I would like to convert it to an array of doubles in Java. I am aware of the obvious way of iterating over the array and creating a new one. I expected Java to digest a float[] smoothly where it wishes to work with double[]... but it can not work with this.
What is the elegant, effective way of doing this conversion?

Basically something has to do the conversion of each value. There isn't an implicit conversion between the two array types because the code used to handle them after JITting would be different - they have a different element size, and the float would need a conversion whereas the double wouldn't. Compare this to array covariance for reference types, where no conversions are required when reading the data (the bit pattern is the same for a String reference as an Object reference, for example) and the element size is the same for all reference types.
In short, something will have to perform conversions in a loop. I don't know of any built-in methods to do this. I'm sure they exist in third party libraries somewhere, but unless you happen to be using one of those libraries already, I'd just write your own method. For the sake of convenience, here's a sample implementation:
public static double[] convertFloatsToDoubles(float[] input)
{
if (input == null)
{
return null; // Or throw an exception - your choice
}
double[] output = new double[input.length];
for (int i = 0; i < input.length; i++)
{
output[i] = input[i];
}
return output;
}

In Java 8 you can, if you really want to, do:
IntStream.range(0, floatArray.length).mapToDouble(i -> floatArray[i]).toArray();
But it's better (cleaner, faster, better semantics) to use Jon Skeet's function.

Do you actually need to copy your float array to a double array? If you are having trouble with the compiler and types when using the floats you can use this...
float x = 0;
double d = Double.valueOf(x);
What advantage do you get by taking a copy? If you need greater precision in the results of computations based on the floats then make the results double. I can see quite a lot of downsides to having a copy of the array, and performing the copy function, especially if it is large. Make sure you really need to do it.
HTH