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Closed 2 years ago.
Given :
String[] directions = {"UP","DOWN","RIGHT","LEFT","up","down","right","left"};
String input = "Up";
How can I verify that an input from stdin
is within the directions
array or not ?
I can make a loop and check each item with input
using equal ,but I'm looking for a more elegant way.
Regards,Ron
Convert the array of valid directions to a list:
List valid = Arrays.asList(directions)
Or just declare it directly as:
List valid = Arrays.asList("UP", "DOWN", "RIGHT", "LEFT", "up", "down", "right", "left")
You can then use the contains
method:
if (valid.contains(input)) {
// is valid
} else {
// not valid
}
Note that this won't match a mixed case input such as "Up" so you might want to store just the uppercase values in the list and then use valid.contains(input.toUpperCase())
Convert your array to a List and than use the contains method.
List mylist = Arrays.asList(directions);
mylist.contains(input);
The contains method returns:
true if the list contains the specified element.
Unfortunately, Java does not have an Arrays.indexOf()
method. Your best bet is to write a little utility to do a simple linear search. Or you could convert to an ArrayList (see Arrays.asList()
) and call indexOf() or contains()
.
If the array is large and speed is a concern, you could sort the array, and then use Arrays.binarySearch().
Use ArrayList
instead and its contains
method
Since we are specifically talking about arrays of strings, not just any array: another approach which solves the case-insensitivity question elegantly would be using regular expressions. Either through the Pattern class or the String's matches method.
if (input.matches("(?i)" + String.join("|", directions))) {
// valid
}
else {
// invalid
}