Simple way to compare 2 ArrayLists

Question

I have 2 arraylists of string object.

List sourceList = new ArrayList();
List destinationList = new ArrayList

        

Answer 1

This should check if two lists are equal, it does some basic checks first (i.e. nulls and lengths), then sorts and uses the collections.equals method to check if they are equal.

public  boolean equalLists(List a, List b){     
    // Check for sizes and nulls

    if (a == null && b == null) return true;


    if ((a == null && b!= null) || (a != null && b== null) || (a.size() != b.size()))
    {
        return false;
    }

    // Sort and compare the two lists          
    Collections.sort(a);
    Collections.sort(b);      
    return a.equals(b);
}