Frank Jania

(May 29, 2003) - Reusable objects for storing collections of data - Vector and HashTable - have been available to Java developers since the language's first release. In Java 1.2, Sun created the collections framework to more completely represent the types of data structures that application programmers require, while offering a set of base abstractions that allow for a separation between collection interface and the implementation. The result is called the collections framework, which represents three key interfaces - set, list, and map. While games can be played to make any implementation of any interfaces work a particular situation, choosing the right implementation can have a positive impact on performance and ease of development. There are a number of advantages to using the collections framework. First and foremost, the most common data structures, algorithms fo... (more)