Using a String to point to a certain list ( or Array )

Question

Say if I have a user input any word they want and I want to save that word to an Array named the first letter of the word they enter. I already initialize these Arrays ( a - z ). So when a user enters for example:

"Apple" and gets saved as word, then I do .substring(0,1).toLowerCase(); and save that as String Letter. How do I go about basically doing Letter.add(word);

At the moment I have 26 if statements and there MUST be an easier way of doing this.

Thank you.

Edit: What I have now is an ArrayList of ArrayLists because it was what our teacher wanted. I called the first Array List, and then the Arrays inside that are named a - z. In one of my methods I want to delete an entry by name. deleteEntry ( String name ). I then get the first letter of that name and put it to lowercase. Then I dont know how I can just do [firstLetter].remove(x) (where x is index of name)

Basically is it possible to do this.

(String).add(Another String);

where the String can only be a letter of the english alphabet.

you have the word String word, and the letter. Perhaps you could use a swich-case (case "a": etc) — Sara S
– Sara S, Commented Apr 27, 2014 at 20:06
You should really post some more code if you want a more precise answer. I don't think it's clear what you have already and what you want. — peter.petrov
– peter.petrov, Commented Apr 27, 2014 at 21:10

plalx · Accepted Answer · 2014-04-27 20:07:46Z

2

You can simply use a Map<Character, List<String>>.

answered Apr 27, 2014 at 20:07

plalx

43.8k7 gold badges77 silver badges94 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

Comments

peter.petrov · Accepted Answer · 2014-04-27 20:13:21Z

1

Define an array arr of ArrayLists of Strings and index this
array from 0 to say 255. The char type can be converted up to int
so you can use char as index of your array.

So just do arr[firstLetter].add(word) where
firstLetter is the char word.charAt(0).

edited Apr 27, 2014 at 20:13

answered Apr 27, 2014 at 20:07

peter.petrov

39.6k23 gold badges114 silver badges193 bronze badges

1 Comment

Zeb Over a year ago

What I have now is an ArrayList of ArrayLists because it was what our teacher wanted. I called the first Array List, and then the Arrays inside that are named a - z. In one of my methods I want to delete an entry by name. deleteEntry ( String name ). I then get the first letter of that name and put it to lowercase. Then I dont know how I can just do [firstLetter].remove(x) (where x is index of name)

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Using a String to point to a certain list ( or Array )

2 Answers 2

Comments

1 Comment

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

2 Answers 2

Comments

1 Comment

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related