How do I join two lists in Java?

Question

Conditions: do not modifiy the original lists; JDK only, no external libraries. Bonus points for a one-liner or a JDK 1.3 version.

Is there a simpler way than:

Answer 1

One of your requirements is to preserve the original lists. If you create a new list and use addAll(), you are effectively doubling the number of references to the objects in your lists. This could lead to memory problems if your lists are very large.

If you don't need to modify the concatenated result, you can avoid this using a custom list implementation. The custom implementation class is more than one line, obviously...but using it is short and sweet.

CompositeUnmodifiableList.java:

public class CompositeUnmodifiableList extends AbstractList {

    private final List list1;
    private final List list2;

    public CompositeUnmodifiableList(List list1, List list2) {
        this.list1 = list1;
        this.list2 = list2;
    }

    @Override
    public E get(int index) {
        if (index < list1.size()) {
            return list1.get(index);
        }
        return list2.get(index-list1.size());
    }

    @Override
    public int size() {
        return list1.size() + list2.size();
    }
}

Usage:

List newList = new CompositeUnmodifiableList(listOne,listTwo);