The expectation is derive 3 lists itemIsBoth
, aItems
, bItems
from the input list items
.
How to convert code like below to functional style? (I understand this code is clear enough in an imperative style, but I want to know does declarative style really fail to deal with such a simple example). Thanks.
for (Item item: items) {
if (item.isA() && item.isB()) {
itemIsBoth.add(item);
} else if (item.isA()) {
aItems.add(item);
} else if (item.isB()){
bItems.add(item)
}
}
The question title is quite broad (convert if-else ladder), but since the actual question asks about a specific scenario, let me offer a sample that can at least illustrate what can be done.
Because the if-else
structure creates three distinct lists based on a predicate applied to the item, we can express this behavior more declaratively as a grouping operation. The only extra needed to make this work out of the box would be to collapse the multiple Boolean predicates using a tagging object. For example:
class Item {
enum Category {A, B, AB}
public Category getCategory() {
return /* ... */;
}
}
Then the logic can be expressed simply as:
Map<Item.Category, List<Item>> categorized =
items.stream().collect(Collectors.groupingBy(Item::getCategory));
where each list can be retrieved from the map given its category.
If it's not possible to change class Item
, the same effect can be achieved by moving the enum declaration and the categorization method outsize the Item
class (the method would become a static method).