How do I determine whether an array contains a particular value in Java?

Question

I have a String[] with values like so:

public static final String[] VALUES = new String[] {\"AB\",\"BC\",\"CD\",\"AE\"};

Given

Answer 1

Developers often do:

Set set = new HashSet(Arrays.asList(arr));
return set.contains(targetValue);

The above code works, but there is no need to convert a list to set first. Converting a list to a set requires extra time. It can as simple as:

Arrays.asList(arr).contains(targetValue);

or

   for(String s: arr){
        if(s.equals(targetValue))
            return true;
    }

return false;

The first one is more readable than the second one.