Comparing Objects

[x-ice]

If i have two objects how can i compare them?

For example.

I have two objects of the same class. They have a variable called 'data' which is a string.

Object 1: data = 'hello'
Object 2: data = 'bye'

I want to compare these objects to see which object would come first (alphabetically) if the 'data' variable of both objects was sorted into alphabetical order.

The order i would be order is Obect 2 and then Object 1, but how can i do this in code?

Thanks.

[ComputerJy]

You can implement the interface "Comparable" in your class and return the String.compareTo(String) value

[x-ice]

You can implement the interface "Comparable" in your class and return the String.compareTo(String) value

Can you give an example on how to do this? I am pretty rusty at Java these days.

[ComputerJy]

public class Sample implements Comparable
{
  private String str ;

  public String getString () {
    return str ;
  }

  public int compareTo (Object o) {
    if (o instanceof Sample) {
      return str.compareTo(((Sample) o).getString()) ;
    }
    else {
      return str.compareTo(o.toString()) ;
    }
  }
}

[x-ice]

public class Sample implements Comparable
{
  private String str ;

  public String getString () {
    return str ;
  }

  public int compareTo (Object o) {
    if (o instanceof Sample) {
      return str.compareTo(((Sample) o).getString()) ;
    }
    else {
      return str.compareTo(o.toString()) ;
    }
  }
}

Thanks