Lambda expression to convert array/List of String

Question

Since Java 8 comes with powerful lambda expressions,

I would like to write a function to convert a List/array of Strings to array/List of Integers, Floats, Doubles etc..

In normal Java, it would be as simple as

for(String str : strList){
   intList.add(Integer.valueOf(str));
}

But how do I achieve the same with a lambda, given an array of Strings to be converted to an array of Integers.

Answer 1

I didn't find it in the previous answers, so, with Java 8 and streams:

Convert String[] to Integer[]:

Arrays.stream(stringArray).map(Integer::valueOf).toArray(Integer[]::new)

Answer 2

You could create helper methods that would convert a list (array) of type T to a list (array) of type U using the map operation on stream.

//for lists
public static <T, U> List<U> convertList(List<T> from, Function<T, U> func) {
    return from.stream().map(func).collect(Collectors.toList());
}

//for arrays
public static <T, U> U[] convertArray(T[] from, 
                                      Function<T, U> func, 
                                      IntFunction<U[]> generator) {
    return Arrays.stream(from).map(func).toArray(generator);
}

And use it like this:

//for lists
List<String> stringList = Arrays.asList("1","2","3");
List<Integer> integerList = convertList(stringList, s -> Integer.parseInt(s));

//for arrays
String[] stringArr = {"1","2","3"};
Double[] doubleArr = convertArray(stringArr, Double::parseDouble, Double[]::new);

---

Note that s -> Integer.parseInt(s) could be replaced with Integer::parseInt (see Method references)

Answer 3

The helper methods from the accepted answer are not needed. Streams can be used with lambdas or usually shortened using Method References. Streams enable functional operations. map() converts the elements and collect(...) or toArray() wrap the stream back up into an array or collection.

Venkat Subramaniam's talk (video) explains it better than me.

1 Convert List<String> to List<Integer>

List<String> l1 = Arrays.asList("1", "2", "3");
List<Integer> r1 = l1.stream().map(Integer::parseInt).collect(Collectors.toList());

// the longer full lambda version:
List<Integer> r1 = l1.stream().map(s -> Integer.parseInt(s)).collect(Collectors.toList());

2 Convert List<String> to int[]

int[] r2 = l1.stream().mapToInt(Integer::parseInt).toArray();

3 Convert String[] to List<Integer>

String[] a1 = {"4", "5", "6"};
List<Integer> r3 = Stream.of(a1).map(Integer::parseInt).collect(Collectors.toList());

4 Convert String[] to int[]

int[] r4 = Stream.of(a1).mapToInt(Integer::parseInt).toArray();

5 Convert String[] to List<Double>

List<Double> r5 = Stream.of(a1).map(Double::parseDouble).collect(Collectors.toList());

6 (bonus) Convert int[] to String[]

int[] a2 = {7, 8, 9};
String[] r6 = Arrays.stream(a2).mapToObj(Integer::toString).toArray(String[]::new);

Lots more variations are possible of course.

Also see Ideone version of these examples. Can click fork and then run to run in the browser.