comparing elements of two arrayList in java

Question

i got two String type arraylist ..one list containing “book1”, “book2”, “book3” and “book4”. And another arrayList contains “book1”, “book2”, “book3”. So, size of first list is 4 and second is 3. And I created another arrayList equal to the size of first list

List<Integer> comparingList = new ArrayList<Integer>();
                    //adding default values as one
                    for(int a=0;a<firstList.size();a++){
                        comparingList.add(0);

                    }

And if any content is equal between two lists, I'm setting 1 instead of 0.

so the new arrayList(comparingList) should have 1,1,1,0 elements

for(int counter = 0;counter < firstList.size();counter++){
for(int counter1 = 0;counter1 < secondList.size();counter1++){
if(firstList.get(counter).equals(secondList.get(counter1))){
    comparingList.set(counter,1);
    break;
}
}

}

but when i do this, i'm not being able to set 1 as I can't get into if condition, can anyone help me please

Answer 1

Only iterate on first arraylist with larger length and check for contains in second arraylist , if found set one else do nothing

for(int counter = 0; counter < firstList.size(); counter++) {
    if(secondList.contains(firstList.get(counter))) {
          comparingList.set(counter,1);
      }
  }

---

Whole java program

Just try to run the below program in http://www.compileonline.com/compile_java_online.php

import java.util.ArrayList;
import java.util.List;

public class CompareArrayListTest{

 public static void main(String[] args) {

    ArrayList<String> firstList = new ArrayList<String>();

    firstList.add("book1");
    firstList.add("book2");
    firstList.add("book3");
    firstList.add("book4");

    ArrayList<String> secondList = new ArrayList<String>();

    secondList.add("book1");
    secondList.add("book2");
    secondList.add("book3");

    List<Integer> comparingList = new ArrayList<Integer>();
    // adding default values as one
    for (int a = 0; a < firstList.size(); a++) {
        comparingList.add(0);

    }

    for (int counter = 0; counter < firstList.size(); counter++) {
        if (secondList.contains(firstList.get(counter))) {
            comparingList.set(counter, 1);
        }
    }

    System.out.println(comparingList);

}

---

BitSet bitset = new BitSet();
// adding default values as one
for (int a = 0; a < firstList.size(); a++) {
    comparingList.add(0);

}

for (int counter = 0; counter < firstList.size(); counter++) {
    for (int counter2 = 0; counter < secondList.size(); counter++) {
        if (secondList.get(counter2).equals(firstList.get(counter))) {
            bitset.set(counter, 1);
        }
    }
}

Answer 2

You can transform the lists to sets, and then use Set.retainAll method for intersection between the different sets. Once you intersect all sets, you are left with the common elements, and you can transform the resulting set back to a list.