Java Ordered Collections and SortedSet Delaware

The Java collections framework includes classes you use to maintain collections of other objects. These collection classes implement interfaces that support different organizations of the objects they contain. For example, classes that implement the List interface keep objects in the order that they are added to the collection and can take a long time to search (proportionate to the number of objects in the collection). Classes that implement the Map interface keep objects in no particular order but are very fast to search (search time is independent of the number of objects in the collection). Classes that implement the SortedSet interface keep a set of objects in a guaranteed order, independent of the order they are added to the collection; this makes them fast to search.

SortedSet

Collection classes that implement the SortedSet interface impose a total ordering on the objects that they contain. There are two kinds of orderings that can be used with a SortedSet.

Instances of SortedSet classes can use the natural ordering of objects in the collection if the objects in the collection implement the Comparable interface. This means that the order of the objects is determined by the objects themselves.

• A SortedSet collection imposes a natural ordering on the objects it contains by calling the compareTo method that is part of the SortedSet interface. An object's compareTo method takes one argument that is the other object it compares the object to. The compareTo method returns a positive integer, 0, or a negative integer depending on whether the object is greater than, equal to, or less than the other object.
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