Java to sort list of custom object on the basis of string

Question

class Person 
 {
 private String name;
 private String profession;
}

profession has values:

• engineer
• Doctor<

Answer 1

My suggestion -

1. Create a new class Profession -

class Profession{

   public Profession(Integer id, String prefessionName){
      this.id=id;
      this.prefessionName=prefessionName;
   }
   Integer id;
   String professionName;

}  

2. Now give Id to each Profession object/instance maintaining the order. For example -

   Profession engineer = new Profession(1, "Engineer"); //since Engineer is in first place 
   Profession doctor = new Profession(2, "Doctor"); //since Doctor is in second place
   Profession teacher = new Profession(3, "Teacher");
   Profession student = new Profession(4, "Student");

3. Now sort the Profession for id using compareable interface.

Answer 2

You can sort your custom object using Collection.sort method like this,

Collections.sort(list, new Comparator(){

        public int compare(Object o1, Object o2) {
            Person p1 = (Person) o1;
            Person p2 = (Person) o2;
            return p1.getProfession().compareToIgnoreCase(p2.getProfession());
        }

    });

To Sort in reverse order just make your return statement line like this,

p2.getProfession().compareToIgnoreCase(p1.getProfession());

This will directly make your list sorted.

Answer 3

Two ways:

1. Implement the Comparable interface
2. Create a Comparator

With the first way you can sort the collection only by the one method compareTo you will define

Your Person.java

class Person implements Comparable<Person> {
    private String name;
    private String profession;

    @Override
    public int compareTo(Person o) {
        return this.profession.compareTo(o.getProfession());
    }

    public String getName() {
        return name;
    }

    public String getProfession() {
        return profession;
    }
}

Then you need to call:

Collections.sort(yourCollection);

With the second way you can sort by one or more Comparator, giving you the ability to compare the same collection with different criteria.

Example of two Comparator

public class PersonSortByNameComparator implements Comparator<Person>{

    @Override
    public int compare(Person p1, Person p2) {
        return p1.getName().compareTo(p2.getName());
    }

}

public class PersonSortByAlphabeticalProfessionComparator implements Comparator<Person>{

    @Override
    public int compare(Person p1, Person p2) {
        return p1.getProfession().compareTo(p2.getProfession());
    }

}

Or this one you need:

public class PersonSortByProfessionComparator implements Comparator<Person> {

    @Override
    public int compare(Person p1, Person p2) {
        if(p1.getProfession().equalsIgnoreCase(p2.getProfession())
            return 0;
        if(p1.getProfession().equalsIgnoreCase("student")
            return -1;
        if(p1.getProfession().equalsIgnoreCase("engineer")
            return 1;
        if(p1.getProfession().equalsIgnoreCase("doctor")
            return 1;
        else
            return -1;
    }
}

And then call one of them:

Collections.sort(yourCollection, new PersonSortByNameComparator());

This blog article is really good written and you can some examples

Answer 4

Add enum to your variables:

class Person {
   private String name;
   private String profession;
   private enum enumProffesion
    {
        Doctor, Teacher, student;
    }
}

After that could add function to the Person class which would give you value of the profession:

public int professionValue()
{
    enumProffesion enumValue= enumProffesion.valueOf(proffesion);
    switch (enumValue) {
    case Doctor: return 1; break;
    case Teacher: return 2; break;
    case student: return 3; break;
    default: return null;
    }
}

After that you just implement logic that will sort all Persons. For that you can help your self with this answer: sorting integers in order lowest to highest java

Answer 5

Implement Comparable

Yes you can implement Comparable. Create a method compareTo(Person obj) and then write your custom logic. You can compare alphabetically or whatever other algorithm you want - for example engineer before doctor because he makes more money :) For alphabetic comparing you can do it like that:

class Person implements Comparable<Person> {

@Override
public int compareTo(Person o) {
    return this.profession.compareTo(o.getProfession());

  }
  private String name;
  private String profession;
}

After that you just use the Collections.sort

Answer 6

Enum

You can do it easily if replace profession field by enum:

class Person implements Comparable<Person> {
    private String name;
    private Profession profession;

    // by this we'll define natural ordering based on ordering
    // in which `Profession` enum values are declared
    @Override
    public int compareTo(Person p) {
        return this.profession.compareTo(p.profession);
    } 
}

And here's Profession enum:

public enum Profession {
    ENGINEER("engineer"), DOCTOR("Doctor"), TEACHER("Teacher"), STUDENT("student");
    
    private String displayName;
    
    Profession(String dn) {
        this.displayName = dn;
    }

    @Override
    public String toString() {
        return this.displayName;
    }
}

If you are new to the enum facility in Java, see Oracle tutorial.