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Java get values from LinkedHashMap with part of the key

I have the following key-value system (HashMap) , where String would be a key like this "2014/12/06".
LinkedHashMap<String, Value>
So, I can retrieve an item knowing the key, but what I'm looking for is a method to retrieve a list of the value which key matches partialy, I mean, how could I retrieve all the values of 2014?.
I would like to avoid solutions like, test every item in the list, brute-force, or similar.
thanks.

Apart from doing the brute-force solution of iterating over all the keys, I can think of two options :
Use a TreeMap, in which the keys are sorted, so you can find the first key that is >= "2014/01/01" (using map.getCeilingEntry("2014/01/01")) and go over all the keys from there.
Use a hierarchy of Maps - i.e. Map<String,Map<String,Value>>. The key in the outer Map would be the year. The key in the inner map would be the full date.

Not possible with LinkedHashMap only. If you can copy the keys to an ordered list you can perform a binary search on that and then do a LinkedHashMap.get(...) with the full key(s).

If you're only ever going to want to retrieve items using the first part of the key, then you want a TreeMap rather than a LinkedHashMap. A LinkedHashMap is sorted according to insertion order, which is no use for this, but a TreeMap is sorted according to natural ordering, or to a Comparator that you supply. This means that you can find the first entry that starts with 2014 efficiently (in log time), and then iterate through until you get to the first one that doesn't match.
If you want to be able to match on any part of the key, then you need a totally different solution, way beyond a simple Map. You'd need to look into full text searching and indexing. You could try something like Lucene.

You could refine a hash function for your values so that values with similar year would hash around similar prefixed hashes. That wouldn't be efficient (probably poor distribution of hashes) nor to the spirit of HashMaps. Use other map implementations such as TreeMaps that keep an order of your choice.

What is LinkedHashMap and what is it used for?

When I was going through a example code which has ListViews I came up with LinkedHashMap.
What is a LinkedHashMap and where can we use it and how? I went through several articles but did not understand fully. Is it necessary when creating ListView. What is the connection between ListViews and LinkedHashMaps? Thank you.

For Simplicity, let us understand what is the difference between HashMap and LinkedHashMap.
HashMap: It gives output in Random orders means there is no proper sequence how we have inserted values.
whereas
LinkedHashMap: It gives output in sequential order.
Let us see a small example: with HashMap
// suppose we have written a program
.
.
// now use HashMap
HashMap map = new HashMap(); // create object
map.put(1,"Rohit"); // insert values
map.put(2,"Rahul");
map.put(3,"Ajay");
System.out.println("MAP=" +map); //print the output using concatenation
//So the output may be in any order like we can say the output may be as:
Map={3=Ajay,2=Rahul,1=Rohit}
but this is not the case in LinkedHashMap
Just replace the "HashMap" with "LinkedHashMap" in the above code
and see
it will display the output in Sequential order like 1=Rohit will be displayed first then the others in sequence.

The docs are here. But its basically a HashMap that also has a linked list, so you can have a consistently ordered iteration through it. Note that this means removals may be O(n) time because you need to remove it from both data structures.

LinkedHashMap is hashmap. But it maintains order of insertion. But HashMap doesnt maintain order.

Hi Linked Hash Map is a Map which stored key value pair,
Linked Hash Map add the values may very slow, But while retrieving the values is very easy.
For fast retrieval of values we could prefer Linked Hash Map.

Adding elements into ArrayList at position larger than the current size

Currently I'm using an ArrayList to store a list of elements, whereby I will need to insert new elements at specific positions. There is a need for me to enter elements at a position larger than the current size. For e.g:
ArrayList<String> arr = new ArrayList<String>();
arr.add(3,"hi");
Now I already know there will be an OutOfBoundsException. Is there another way or another object where I can do this while still keeping the order? This is because I have methods that finds elements based on their index. For e.g.:
ArrayList<String> arr = new ArrayList<String>();
arr.add("hi");
arr.add(0,"hello");
I would expect to find "hi" at index 1 instead of index 0 now.
So in summary, short of manually inserting null into the elements in-between, is there any way to satisfy these two requirements:
Insert elements into position larger than current size
Push existing elements to the right when I insert elements in the middle of the list
I've looked at Java ArrayList add item outside current size, as well as HashMap, but HashMap doesn't satisfy my second criteria. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
P.S. Performance is not really an issue right now.
UPDATE: There have been some questions on why I have these particular requirements, it is because I'm working on operational transformation, where I'm inserting a set of operations into, say, my list (a math formula). Each operation contains a string. As I insert/delete strings into my list, I will dynamically update the unapplied operations (if necessary) through the tracking of each operation that has already been applied. My current solution now is to use a subclass of ArrayList and override some of the methods. I would certainly like to know if there is a more elegant way of doing so though.

Your requirements are contradictory:
... I will need to insert new elements at specific positions.
There is a need for me to enter elements at a position larger than the current size.
These imply that positions are stable; i.e. that an element at a given position remains at that position.
I would expect to find "hi" at index 1 instead of index 0 now.
This states that positions are not stable under some circumstances.
You really need to make up your mind which alternative you need.
If you must have stable positions, use a TreeMap or HashMap. (A TreeMap allows you to iterate the keys in order, but at the cost of more expensive insertion and lookup ... for a large collection.) If necessary, use a "position" key type that allows you to "always" generate a new key that goes between any existing pair of keys.
If you don't have to have stable positions, use an ArrayList, and deal with the case where you have to insert beyond the end position using append.
I fail to see how it is sensible for positions to be stable if you insert beyond the end, and allow instability if you insert in the middle. (Besides, the latter is going to make the former unstable eventually ...)

even you can use TreeMap for maintaining order of keys.

First and foremost, I would say use Map instead of List. I guess your problem can be solved in better way if you use Map. But in any case if you really want to do this with Arraylist
ArrayList<String> a = new ArrayList<String>(); //Create empty list
a.addAll(Arrays.asList( new String[100])); // add n number of strings, actually null . here n is 100, but you will have to decide the ideal value of this, depending upon your requirement.
a.add(7,"hello");
a.add(2,"hi");
a.add(1,"hi2");

Use Vector class to solve this issue.
Vector vector = new Vector();
vector.setSize(100);
vector.set(98, "a");
When "setSize" is set to 100 then all 100 elements gets initialized with null values.

For those who are still dealing with this, you may do it like this.
Object[] array= new Object[10];
array[0]="1";
array[3]= "3";
array[2]="2";
array[7]="7";
List<Object> list= Arrays.asList(array);
But the thing is you need to identify the total size first, this should be just a comment but I do not have much reputation to do that.

Java find nearest (or equal) value in collection

I have a class along the lines of:
public class Observation {
private String time;
private double x;
private double y;
//Constructors + Setters + Getters
}
I can choose to store these objects in any type of collection (Standard class or 3rd party like Guava). I have stored some example data in an ArrayList below, but like I said I am open to any other type of collection that will do the trick. So, some example data:
ArrayList<Observation> ol = new ArrayList<Observation>();
ol.add(new Observation("08:01:23",2.87,3.23));
ol.add(new Observation("08:01:27",2.96,3.17));
ol.add(new Observation("08:01:27",2.93,3.20));
ol.add(new Observation("08:01:28",2.93,3.21));
ol.add(new Observation("08:01:30",2.91,3.23));
The example assumes a matching constructor in Observation. The timestamps are stored as String objects as I receive them as such from an external source but I am happy to convert them into something else. I receive the observations in chronological order so I can create and rely on a sorted collection of observations. The timestamps are NOT unique (as can be seen in the example data) so I cannot create a unique key based on time.
Now to the problem. I frequently need to find one (1) observation with a time equal or nearest to a certain time, e.g if my time was 08:01:29 I would like to fetch the 4th observation in the example data and if the time is 08:01:27 I want the 3rd observation.
I can obviously iterate through the collection until I find the time that I am looking for, but I need to do this frequently and at the end of the day I may have millions of observations so I need to find a solution where I can locate the relevant observations in an efficient manner.
I have looked at various collection-types including ones where I can filter the collections with Predicates but I have failed to find a solution that would return one value, as opposed to a subset of the collection that fulfills the "<="-condition. I am essentially looking for the SQL equivalent of SELECT * FROM ol WHERE time <= t LIMIT 1.
I am sure there is a smart and easy way to solve my problem so I am hoping to be enlightened. Thank you in advance.

Try TreeSet providing a comparator that compares the time. It mantains an ordered set and you can ask for TreeSet.floor(E) to find the greatest min (you should provide a dummy Observation with the time you are looking for). You also have headSet and tailSet for ordered subsets.
It has O(log n) time for adding and retrieving. I think is very suitable for your needs.
If you prefer a Map you can use a TreeMap with similar methods.

Sort your collection (ArrayList will probably work best here) and use BinarySearch which returns an integer index of either a match of the "closest" possible match, ie it returns an...
index of the search key, if it is contained in the list; otherwise, (-(insertion point) - 1). The insertion point is defined as the point at which the key would be inserted into the list: the index of the first element greater than the key, or list.size(),

Have the Observation class implement Comparable and use a TreeSet to store the objects, which will keep the elements sorted. TreeSet implements SortedSet, so you can use headSet or tailSet to get a view of the set before or after the element you're searching for. Use the first or last method on the returned set to get the element you're seeking.
If you are stuck with ArrayList, but can keep the elements sorted yourself, use Collections.binarySearch to search for the element. It returns a positive number if the exact element is found, or a negative number that can be used to determine the closest element. http://download.oracle.com/javase/1.4.2/docs/api/java/util/Collections.html#binarySearch(java.util.List,%20java.lang.Object)

If you are lucky enough to be using Java 6, and the performance overhead of keeping a SortedSet is not a big deal for you. Take a look at TreeSet ceiling, floor, higher and lower methods.

Question regarding Java's LinkedList class

I have a question regarding the LinkedList class in Java.
I have a scenario wherein i need to add or set an index based on whether the index exists in the linkedlist or not. A pseudo-code of what i want to achieve is --
if index a exists within the linkedlist ll
ll.set(a,"arbit")
else
ll.add(a,"arbit")
I did go through the Javadocs for the LinkedList class but did not come across anything relevant.
Any ideas ?
Thanks
p1ng

What about using a Map for this:
Map<Integer, String> map = new HashMap<Integer, String>();
// ...
int a = 5;
map.put(a, "arbit");
Even if a already exists, put will just replace the old String.

Searching in linked list is not very efficient (O(n)). Have you considering using different data structure - e.g. HashMap which would give you O(1) access time?

If you need sequential access as well as keyed access you might want to try a LinkedHashMap, available as from 1.4.2
http://download.oracle.com/javase/1.4.2/docs/api/java/util/LinkedHashMap.html

Map<Integer, String> is definitely a good (the best?) way to go here.
Here's an option for keeping with LinkedList if that's for some bizarre reason a requirement. It has horrible runtime performance and disallows null, since null now becomes an indicator that an index isn't occupied.
String toInsert = "arbit";
int a = 5;
//grow the list to allow index a
while ( a >= ll.size() ) {
ll.add(null);
}
//set index a to the new value
ll.set(a, toInsert);
If you're going to take this gross road, you might be better off with an ArrayList.
Why is it so bad? Say you had only one element at index 100,000. This implementation would require 100,000 entries in the list pointing to null. This results in horrible runtime performance and memory usage.

LinkedList cannot have holes inside, so you can't have list [1,2,3,4] and then ll.add(10,10), so I think there's something wrong with your example. Use either Map or search for some other sparse array

It looks like you're trying to use a as a key, and don't state whether you have items at index i < a. If you run your code when ll.size() <= a then you'll end up with a NullPointerException.
And if you add an item at index a the previous item at a will now be at a+1.
In this case it would be best to remove item at a first (if it exists) then add item "arbit" into a. Of course, the condition above re: ll.size() <=a still applies here.
If the order of the results is important, a different approach could use a HashMap<Integer,String> to create your dataset, then extract the keys using HashMap<?,?>.getKeySet() then sort them in their natural order (they're numeric after all) then extract the values from the map while iterating over the keySet. Nasty, but does what you want... Or create your own OrderedMap class, that does the same...
Could you expand on why you need to use a LinkedList? Is ordering of the results important?