001 /*--------------------------------------------------------------------------+ 002 $Id: ISortableData.java 28499 2010-06-22 09:38:45Z deissenb $ 003 | | 004 | Copyright 2005-2010 Technische Universitaet Muenchen | 005 | | 006 | Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License"); | 007 | you may not use this file except in compliance with the License. | 008 | You may obtain a copy of the License at | 009 | | 010 | http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0 | 011 | | 012 | Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software | 013 | distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, | 014 | WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. | 015 | See the License for the specific language governing permissions and | 016 | limitations under the License. | 017 +--------------------------------------------------------------------------*/ 018 package edu.tum.cs.commons.collections; 019 020 /** 021 * Abstraction for sortable/comparable data. Implementations of this interface 022 * can be used with {@link SortableDataUtils} to supports basic algorithms, such 023 * as sorting and binary search on any data which can be mapped to a random 024 * access list. The main benefit of this interface is that the type of data is 025 * operated on must not be known (or be a concrete type), thus it can also be 026 * used to sort data spread over multiple lists or arrays. 027 * 028 * @author hummelb 029 * @author $Author: deissenb $ 030 * @version $Rev: 28499 $ 031 * @levd.rating GREEN Hash: 8FEEC55647374909933C02DCDA3F8DE8 032 */ 033 public interface ISortableData { 034 035 /** Returns the number of elements. */ 036 int size(); 037 038 /** 039 * Returns whether the element stored at index <code>i</code> is smaller 040 * than the one stored at <code>j</code>. 041 */ 042 boolean isLess(int i, int j); 043 044 /** Swaps the elements at the given indices. */ 045 void swap(int i, int j); 046 }