Explain Working of compareTo() method with respect to this example

[saurabhthard aggarwal]

/* WHEN IS COMPARETO METHOD CALLED, WHY DO WE NEED TO PUT ELEMENTS OF TREESET IN TO AN OBJECT ARRAY AND THEN TYPE CAST IT.
*/


import java.util.*;

class Comparable1
{
public static void main(String[] args)
{
TreeSet ts1=new TreeSet();

ts1.add(new Student("Saurabh","Thard",100,0.1));

ts1.add(new Student("Sachin","Tendulkar",200,0.01));

ts1.add(new Student("Prannoy","Roy",300,03.03));

ts1.add(new Student("Barkha","Dutt",400,04.4));

ts1.add(new Student("Vikram","Chandra",500,5.05));

Object [] studArray=ts1.toArray();

Student s;

for(Object obj:studArray)

{
s=(Student) obj;

System.out.printf("NAME = %s %s STUDENT ID =%d GPA=%.1f \n",s.fname(),s.lname(),
s.StudentID(),s.gpa());

}
}
}
class Student implements Comparable
{

String fname;
String lname;
int studentID;
double gpa;

public Student(String fname,String lname,int studentID,double gpa)
{

if(fname==null || lname==null || studentID==0 || gpa==0.0)

{
throw new IllegalArgumentException();
}

this.fname=fname;
this.lname=lname;
this.studentID=studentID;
this.gpa=gpa;
}

public String fname()
{
return fname;
}

public String lname()
{
return lname;
}

public int StudentID()
{
return studentID;
}

public double gpa()
{
return gpa;
}

public int compareTo(Object o) //OVER-RIDING COMPARETO SINCE IT IMPLEMENTS COMPARABLE.
{
double f= gpa- ((Student)o).gpa;

if(f==0.0)
return 0;

else if(f<0.0)
return -1;

else
return 1;
}
}

[Harshit Rastogi]

please always used code tags

 class Comparable1 
{ 
public static void main(String[] args) 
{ 
TreeSet ts1=new TreeSet(); 

ts1.add(new Student("Saurabh","Thard",100,0.1)); 

ts1.add(new Student("Sachin","Tendulkar",200,0.01)); 

ts1.add(new Student("Prannoy","Roy",300,03.03)); 

ts1.add(new Student("Barkha","Dutt",400,04.4)); 

ts1.add(new Student("Vikram","Chandra",500,5.05)); 

Object [] studArray=ts1.toArray(); 

Student s; 

for(Object obj:studArray) 

{ 
s=(Student) obj; 

System.out.printf("NAME = %s %s STUDENT ID =%d GPA=%.1f \n",s.fname(),s.lname(), 
s.StudentID(),s.gpa()); 

} 
} 
} 
class Student implements Comparable 
{ 

String fname; 
String lname; 
int studentID; 
double gpa; 

public Student(String fname,String lname,int studentID,double gpa) 
{ 

if(fname==null || lname==null || studentID==0 || gpa==0.0) 

{ 
throw new IllegalArgumentException(); 
} 

this.fname=fname; 
this.lname=lname; 
this.studentID=studentID; 
this.gpa=gpa; 
} 

public String fname() 
{ 
return fname; 
} 

public String lname() 
{ 
return lname; 
} 

public int StudentID() 
{ 
return studentID; 
} 

public double gpa() 
{ 
return gpa; 
} 

public int compareTo(Object o) //OVER-RIDING COMPARETO SINCE IT IMPLEMENTS COMPARABLE. 
{ 
double f= gpa- ((Student)o).gpa; 

if(f==0.0) 
return 0; 

else if(f<0.0) 
return -1; 

else 
return 1; 
} 
   

[Harshit Rastogi]

WHEN IS COMPARETO METHOD CALLED,

its is called every time you add an element to TreeSet. Since treeset by default does the sorting on the basis of comparator implemented for the class. In this case Student is object and the Student class is implementing comparator interface.

[Ankit Garg]

Well the compareTo method will actually be called only when add method is called on a TreeSet which has any elements. If there are no elements in the TreeSet, then the method will not be called on adding an element .

And as far as the type casting goes, you have to do that only because you didn't use generics. If you use this syntax for your declaration

TreeSet<Student> ts1=new TreeSet<Strudent>();

Then you don't need any type casts and you can use the enhanced for loop like this

for(Student s:studArray)   
{   
    System.out.printf("NAME = %s %s STUDENT ID =%d GPA=%.1f \n",s.fname(),s.lname(), s.StudentID(),s.gpa());    
}