Adding elements to a collection during iteration

Question

Is it possible to add elements to a collection while iterating over it?

More specifically, I would like to iterate over a collection, and if an element satisfies a certain condition I want to add some other elements to the collection, and make sure that these added elements are iterated over as well. (I realise that this could lead to an unterminating loop, but I'm pretty sure it won't in my case.)

The Java Tutorial from Sun suggests this is not possible: "Note that Iterator.remove is the only safe way to modify a collection during iteration; the behavior is unspecified if the underlying collection is modified in any other way while the iteration is in progress."

So if I can't do what I want to do using iterators, what do you suggest I do?

Answer 1

I prefer to process collections functionally rather than mutate them in place. That avoids this kind of problem altogether, as well as aliasing issues and other tricky sources of bugs.

So, I would implement it like:

List<Thing> expand(List<Thing> inputs) {
    List<Thing> expanded = new ArrayList<Thing>();

    for (Thing thing : inputs) {
        expanded.add(thing);
        if (needsSomeMoreThings(thing)) {
            addMoreThingsTo(expanded);
        }
    }

    return expanded;
}

Answer 2

Given a list List<Object> which you want to iterate over, the easy-peasy way is:

while (!list.isEmpty()){
   Object obj = list.get(0);

   // do whatever you need to
   // possibly list.add(new Object obj1);

   list.remove(0);
}

So, you iterate through a list, always taking the first element and then removing it. This way you can append new elements to the list while iterating.

Answer 3

Actually it is rather easy. Just think for the optimal way. I beleive the optimal way is:

for (int i=0; i<list.size(); i++) {
   Level obj = list.get(i);

   //Here execute yr code that may add / or may not add new element(s)
   //...

   i=list.indexOf(obj);
}

The following example works perfectly in the most logical case - when you dont need to iterate the added new elements before the iteration element. About the added elements after the iteration element - there you might want not to iterate them either. In this case you should simply add/or extend yr object with a flag that will mark them not to iterate them.

Answer 4

This is what I usually do, with collections like sets:

Set<T> adds = new HashSet<T>, dels = new HashSet<T>;
for ( T e: target )
  if ( <has to be removed> ) dels.add ( e );
  else if ( <has to be added> ) adds.add ( <new element> )

target.removeAll ( dels );
target.addAll ( adds );

This creates some extra-memory (the pointers for intermediate sets, but no duplicated elements happen) and extra-steps (iterating again over changes), however usually that's not a big deal and it might be better than working with an initial collection copy.

Answer 5

public static void main(String[] args)
{
    // This array list simulates source of your candidates for processing
    ArrayList<String> source = new ArrayList<String>();
    // This is the list where you actually keep all unprocessed candidates
    LinkedList<String> list = new LinkedList<String>();

    // Here we add few elements into our simulated source of candidates
    // just to have something to work with
    source.add("first element");
    source.add("second element");
    source.add("third element");
    source.add("fourth element");
    source.add("The Fifth Element"); // aka Milla Jovovich

    // Add first candidate for processing into our main list
    list.addLast(source.get(0));

    // This is just here so we don't have to have helper index variable
    // to go through source elements
    source.remove(0);

    // We will do this until there are no more candidates for processing
    while(!list.isEmpty())
    {
        // This is how we get next element for processing from our list
        // of candidates. Here our candidate is String, in your case it
        // will be whatever you work with.
        String element = list.pollFirst();
        // This is where we process the element, just print it out in this case
        System.out.println(element);

        // This is simulation of process of adding new candidates for processing
        // into our list during this iteration.
        if(source.size() > 0) // When simulated source of candidates dries out, we stop
        {
            // Here you will somehow get your new candidate for processing
            // In this case we just get it from our simulation source of candidates.
            String newCandidate = source.get(0);
            // This is the way to add new elements to your list of candidates for processing
            list.addLast(newCandidate);
            // In this example we add one candidate per while loop iteration and 
            // zero candidates when source list dries out. In real life you may happen
            // to add more than one candidate here:
            // list.addLast(newCandidate2);
            // list.addLast(newCandidate3);
            // etc.

            // This is here so we don't have to use helper index variable for iteration
            // through source.
            source.remove(0);
        }
    }
}

Answer 6

Besides the solution of using an additional list and calling addAll to insert the new items after the iteration (as e.g. the solution by user Nat), you can also use concurrent collections like the CopyOnWriteArrayList.

The "snapshot" style iterator method uses a reference to the state of the array at the point that the iterator was created. This array never changes during the lifetime of the iterator, so interference is impossible and the iterator is guaranteed not to throw ConcurrentModificationException.

With this special collection (usually used for concurrent access) it is possible to manipulate the underlying list while iterating over it. However, the iterator will not reflect the changes.

Is this better than the other solution? Probably not, I don't know the overhead introduced by the Copy-On-Write approach.