CO4025
Introduction to
Computer Programming
Lecture 10
Array Lists
Introduction
We’re going to look at ArrayList Objects
These are dynamic containers available within
Java
They are more flexible than arrays
We’ll see how to manipulate them with a list of
integers
We’ll expand the mechanism to deal with lists of
objects
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 2
ArrayList
Java provides a number of container classes that enable
use to store data
We’ve seen how to handle one-dimensional and two-
dimensional arrays
We’re going to look at Java’s ArrayList class
This behaves like a one-dimensional array but it’s
dynamic
This means that we can expand or contract the array by
simply adding or removing elements
The syntax is not the same as that for arrays
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 3
Handling a List of Integers
We’re going to write a simple program to do the
following tasks:
Create a list of integers
Fill the list with random numbers
Output the contents of the list
We’ll also demonstrate the effects of some
ArrayList methods
We’ll write a couple of methods to fill the list and
output it
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 4
Declaring an ArrayList Object
We need to import the java.util. library to utilise
ArrayList objects
Within main() we declare a new ArrayList object,
integerList:
ArrayList integerList = new ArrayList();
We call a method, fillArrayList with integerList
and the number of elements that wish to add to the list as
arguments:
fillArrayList(integerList, 10);
Then we pass the list to a method that outputs the contents:
printArrayList(integerList);
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 5
fillArrayList Method
The fillArrayList method is called with an ArrayList and an integer
representing its size
size controls the loop within which we assign a random number to successive
elements of the list
We call the ArrayLists’s add method with two arguments:
i – the current element of the list
The random number that has been generated, which is stored at the location pointed to by i
private static void fillArrayList(ArrayList arrayIn, int size) {
Random rand = new Random(); //random number generator
int n = 10;
//assign random value 1 - n to each element of array
for(int i = 0; i < size; i++){
arrayIn.add(i, (1 + (Math.abs(rand.nextInt()) % n)));
}
}
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 6
printArrayList Method
The printArrayList method is called with an ArrayList
We call this object’s size() method to control the loop that iterates through
the list
We output a label indicating which element we’re outputting
We also call the list’s get() method with the controlling counter i as an
argument to retrieve the element currently pointed to
All the information is printed to the screen
private static void printArrayList(ArrayList arrayIn) {
for(int i = 0; i < arrayIn.size(); i++){
System.out.println("integerList #" + i + "
contains " + arrayIn.get(i));
}
}
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 7
Program Output
If we run the program we see that random numbers between 1 and
10 have been added to the list and output:
integerList #0 contains 7
integerList #1 contains 8
integerList #2 contains 10
integerList #3 contains 5
integerList #4 contains 4
integerList #5 contains 6
integerList #6 contains 5
integerList #7 contains 2
integerList #8 contains 10
integerList #9 contains 7
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 8
Manipulating the ArrayList:
set()
ArrayList objects provide a number of
methods to manipulate the contents of the list
The set() method takes two arguments:
The index of the element position
The value of the object that is to be placed at that
position in the list
This replaces the existing value
We can see the effect of the following call
because the existing numbers in the list are < 11
integerList.set(5,20);
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 9
Manipulating the ArrayList:
add()
The add() method expands the list
It takes two arguments:
The index of the element position
The value of the object that is to be placed at that
position in the list
This inserts a new value into the list
We can see the effect of the following call where
we expect the previous value at element 6 to be
pushed one element down the list
integerList.add(6,21);
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 10
Manipulating the ArrayList:
remove()
The remove() method contracts the list
There are two versions: each takes a single
argument:
The index of the element position from which data are
to be removed
A specific object to be removed from the list
This deletes the selected object
We remove the first element of the list
integerList.remove(0);
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 11
Calling set() and add()
integerList #0 contains 7 The original
integerList #1 contains 8 contents of element
integerList #2 contains 10 #5 was 6
integerList #3 contains 5
When we call the
set() and add()
integerList #4 contains 4 methods we see
integerList #5 contains 20 that element #5 is
integerList #6 contains 21 replaced by 20
integerList #7 contains 5 We see that the
rest of the list has
integerList #8 contains 2 been moved down
integerList #9 contains 10 one place and
integerList #10 contains 7 element #6
contains 21
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 12
Calling remove()
integerList #0 contains 8 We call remove() with
integerList #1 contains 10 the first element of the
list and output the
integerList #2 contains 5 results
integerList #3 contains 4 We see that the initial
integerList #4 contains 20 value 7 has
disappeared
integerList #5 contains 21 And the list has
integerList #6 contains 5 contracted by one
integerList #7 contains 2 element
integerList #8 contains 10
integerList #9 contains 7
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 13
Handling an ArrayList of Objects
We can use the same mechanism we’ve seen
so far to manipulate an ArrayList of objects
We need to do a bit more work to handle the
individual attributes of objects
We’ll use our Person class to illustrate
Within main() we declare the list and call two
methods with it:
ArrayList personList = new ArrayList();
fillObjectArrayList(personList);
printObjectArrayList(personList);
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 14
Entering Object Data into the List
Within the method we initialise a loop
We give the user the option of quitting
If they do we exit the loop
Otherwise we create a Person object
Then we elicit attribute data from the user and assign the
attributes:
Name: call setName()
Gender: call setGender()
Date of birth
Month of birth
Year of birth
Call setDOB() with these data
Then we add the instantiated Person object to the ArrayList
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 15
Entering Object Data into the List
private static void fillObjectArrayList(ArrayList arrayIn) throws IOException {
String s = "";
do {
System.out.println("enter name... (q to quit) ");
s = userInput.readLine();
if(s.toLowerCase().equals("q"))
break;
Person p = new Person();
p.setName(s);
System.out.println("enter gender ");
s = userInput.readLine();
p.setGender(s);
System.out.println("enter date of birth ");
int date = Integer.parseInt(userInput.readLine());
System.out.println("enter month of birth ");
int month = Integer.parseInt(userInput.readLine());
System.out.println("enter year of birth ");
int year = Integer.parseInt(userInput.readLine());
p.setDOB(date, month, year);
arrayIn.add(p);
}while(! s.toLowerCase().equals("q"));
}
16
Outputting Object Data From the
List
Within the method we create a new Person
object, p
We step through each element of the list
We retrieve the current object using the get()
method
We cast the retrieved object to a Person object and
assign it to p
Then we extract p’s attributes and output the details
with appropriate labels
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 17
Outputting Object Data From the
List
private static void printObjectArrayList(ArrayList arrayIn) {
Person p = new Person();
for(int i = 0; i < arrayIn.size(); i++){
p = (Person) arrayIn.get(i);
System.out.println("Person #" + i + "'s details:");
System.out.println("Name " + p.getName());
System.out.println("Gender " + p.getGender());
System.out.println("DOB " + p.getDateOfBirth() +
'/' + p.getMonthOfBirth()
+ '/' + p.getYearOfBirth());
System.out.println("Approximate age " + p.getAge());
}
}
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 18
Output
Person #0's details:
Name billy
Gender male
We can see
DOB 12/12/1990 that three
Approximate age 17 objects have
Person #1's details: been placed on
Name jack the list
Gender male Their contents
DOB 2/5/1989
Approximate age 18
have been
Person #2's details:
retrieved and
Name jill displayed
Gender female
DOB 7/4/2001
Approximate age 6
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 19
Conclusion
We’ve look at dynamic ArrayList
objects available within Java
We’ve seen their flexibility in manipulating
lists of integers and lists of objects
Next, we’ll see how to store and retrieve
data from files
CO4025 Introduction to Programming 20
