Collections sort not being accepted by Eclipse

Question

    import java.io.BufferedReader;
    import java.util.Collections;
    import java.io.File;
    import java.io.FileNotFoundException;
    import java.io.FileReader         


        

Answer 1

The Comparator implemented in the CompareLastName class can be put outside the SortNames class, or at least outside the CelebrityNamesFile class. I was having the exact same issue until I put the class that implements my Comparator outside of my object class. After I did this, the program worked perfectly. Here's a sample of my code with comments if it helps.

// Comparator interface for my Word Class.
public interface Comparator
{ 
    int compare(Word first, Word second); 
}

// Word Class, which is my object.
public class Word
{
    private String word;
    public Word(String input)  { word = input; }
    public String get()  { return word; }
    public int wordSize()  { return word.length(); }
}

// Comparator implementation is separate from my Word Class.
public class WordComparator implements Comparator
{
    public int compare(Word first, Word second)
    {
        if (first.wordSize() < second.wordSize())  { return -1; }
        else if (first.wordSize() > second.wordSize())  { return 1; }
        else  { return first.get().compareTo(second.get()); }
    }
}

// Now run the program to ensure the Word Class objects and the WordComparator
// Class are implemented correctly.
public class WordComparatorDemo
{
    public static void main(String[] args) throws FileNotFoundException
    {
        ArrayList list = new ArrayList();
        JFileChooser find = new JFileChooser();
        Scanner read = null;
        if(find.showOpenDialog(null) == JFileChooser.APPROVE_OPTION)
        {
            File selectedFile = find.getSelectedFile();
            read = new Scanner(selectedFile);
            try
            {
                list = inputData(read);
                // Here's the sort implementing the WordComparator.
                Collections.sort(list, new WordComparator());
            }
            finally  { read.close(); }
        }
    }
    public static ArrayList inputData(Scanner in)
    {
        ArrayList list = new ArrayList();
        in.useDelimiter("[^A-Za-z]+");
        while(in.hasNext())
        {
            String word = in.next();
            Word temp = new Word(word);
            list.add(temp);
        }
        return list;
    }
}

Note: My answer is a year after the original post, but hopefully it will help anyone who visits this site for help.