Why should a Java class implement comparable?

Question

Why is Java Comparable used? Why would someone implement Comparable in a class? What is a real life example where you need to implement comparable

Answer 1

Here is a real life sample. Note that String also implements Comparable.

class Author implements Comparable<Author>{
    String firstName;
    String lastName;

    @Override
    public int compareTo(Author other){
        // compareTo should return < 0 if this is supposed to be
        // less than other, > 0 if this is supposed to be greater than 
        // other and 0 if they are supposed to be equal
        int last = this.lastName.compareTo(other.lastName);
        return last == 0 ? this.firstName.compareTo(other.firstName) : last;
    }
}

later..

/**
 * List the authors. Sort them by name so it will look good.
 */
public List<Author> listAuthors(){
    List<Author> authors = readAuthorsFromFileOrSomething();
    Collections.sort(authors);
    return authors;
}

/**
 * List unique authors. Sort them by name so it will look good.
 */
public SortedSet<Author> listUniqueAuthors(){
    List<Author> authors = readAuthorsFromFileOrSomething();
    return new TreeSet<Author>(authors);
}

Answer 2

When you implement Comparable interface, you need to implement method compareTo(). You need it to compare objects, in order to use, for example, sorting method of ArrayList class. You need a way to compare your objects to be able to sort them. So you need a custom compareTo() method in your class so you can use it with the ArrayList sort method. The compareTo() method returns -1,0,1.

I have just read an according chapter in Java Head 2.0, I'm still learning.

Answer 3

The fact that a class implements Comparable means that you can take two objects from that class and compare them. Some classes, like certain collections (sort function in a collection) that keep objects in order rely on them being comparable (in order to sort you need to know which object is the "biggest" and so forth).

Answer 4

For example when you want to have a sorted collection or map

Answer 5

An easy way to implement multiple field comparisons is with Guava's ComparisonChain - then you can say

   public int compareTo(Foo that) {
     return ComparisonChain.start()
         .compare(lastName, that.lastName)
         .compare(firstName, that.firstName)
         .compare(zipCode, that.zipCode)
         .result();
   }

instead of

  public int compareTo(Person other) {
    int cmp = lastName.compareTo(other.lastName);
    if (cmp != 0) {
      return cmp;
    }
    cmp = firstName.compareTo(other.firstName);
    if (cmp != 0) {
      return cmp;
    }
    return Integer.compare(zipCode, other.zipCode);
  }
}

Answer 6

Comparable is used to compare instances of your class. We can compare instances from many ways that is why we need to implement a method compareTo in order to know how (attributes) we want to compare instances.

Dog class:

package test;
import java.util.Arrays;

public class Main {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Dog d1 = new Dog("brutus");
        Dog d2 = new Dog("medor");
        Dog d3 = new Dog("ara");
        Dog[] dogs = new Dog[3];
        dogs[0] = d1;
        dogs[1] = d2;
        dogs[2] = d3;

        for (int i = 0; i < 3; i++) {
            System.out.println(dogs[i].getName());
        }
        /**
         * Output:
         * brutus
         * medor
         * ara
         */

        Arrays.sort(dogs, Dog.NameComparator);
        for (int i = 0; i < 3; i++) {
            System.out.println(dogs[i].getName());
        }
        /**
         * Output:
         * ara
         * medor
         * brutus
         */

    }
}

Main class:

package test;

import java.util.Arrays;

public class Main {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Dog d1 = new Dog("brutus");
        Dog d2 = new Dog("medor");
        Dog d3 = new Dog("ara");
        Dog[] dogs = new Dog[3];
        dogs[0] = d1;
        dogs[1] = d2;
        dogs[2] = d3;

        for (int i = 0; i < 3; i++) {
            System.out.println(dogs[i].getName());
        }
        /**
         * Output:
         * brutus
         * medor
         * ara
         */

        Arrays.sort(dogs, Dog.NameComparator);
        for (int i = 0; i < 3; i++) {
            System.out.println(dogs[i].getName());
        }
        /**
         * Output:
         * ara
         * medor
         * brutus
         */

    }
}

Here is a good example how to use comparable in Java:

http://www.onjava.com/pub/a/onjava/2003/03/12/java_comp.html?page=2