Path: csiph.com!x330-a1.tempe.blueboxinc.net!newsfeed.hal-mli.net!feeder1.hal-mli.net!nx02.iad01.newshosting.com!newshosting.com!69.16.185.16.MISMATCH!npeer02.iad.highwinds-media.com!news.highwinds-media.com!feed-me.highwinds-media.com!post01.iad.highwinds-media.com!newsfe01.iad.POSTED!8ad76e89!not-for-mail
From: Arved Sandstrom <asandstrom3minus1@eastlink.ca>
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.9.2.17) Gecko/20110424 Lightning/1.0b2 Thunderbird/3.1.10
MIME-Version: 1.0
Newsgroups: comp.lang.java.programmer
Subject: Re: "Program to an interface" - When to break a design pattern
References: <9dt5s6dalhetgfe99qs92c02hf0dbas44e@4ax.com>	<2psjssq4zj.fsf@shell.xmission.com> <ipv16s$gho$1@dont-email.me>	<2poc3gq3p2.fsf@shell.xmission.com> <ipv2ej$ka6$1@dont-email.me> <2pk4e4q2sq.fsf@shell.xmission.com> <ipv6q5$vq4$1@dont-email.me> <SPFwp.15920$rB2.9262@newsfe21.iad> <ipvfbo$o57$1@dont-email.me> <P%Pwp.14014$ei6.7822@newsfe19.iad> <iq1973$i3r$1@dont-email.me> <MaZwp.20509$uh5.13403@newsfe02.iad> <iq1pn1$ck2$1@dont-email.me>
In-Reply-To: <iq1pn1$ck2$1@dont-email.me>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Lines: 27
Message-ID: <nQ_wp.26257$vC5.6955@newsfe01.iad>
X-Complaints-To: abuse@newsgroups-download.com
NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 06 May 2011 22:43:31 UTC
Organization: Public Usenet Newsgroup Access
Date: Fri, 06 May 2011 19:43:31 -0300
Xref: x330-a1.tempe.blueboxinc.net comp.lang.java.programmer:3725

On 11-05-06 06:37 PM, Daniele Futtorovic wrote:
[ SNIP ]

> And I argued it should be Map. Because it being a LinkedHashMap does not
> add any significant functional knowledge. The method, as you rightly
> observed some posts ago, does not take an argument, so it is reasonable
> to assume that the caller has no prior knowledge of the returned data's
> ordering. Therefore, since it being a LinkedHashMap does not add any
> predictability unless you know the order, and since that's the only
> functional peculiarity of a LinkedHashap, I concluded that knowing it's
> a LinkedHashMap is irrelevant. And since one ought to use types as broad
> as possible and as narrow as necessary, I opined that the return-type
> ought to be Map.
> 
> As I said, I believe the only exception to this is if the caller itself
> is the one inserting in that Map from somewhere else and needs to retain
> the prior order.
[ SNIP ]

OP quote: "I need the map to retain the insertion order".

That's all I need right there. All efforts to convince him to return a
Map are simply efforts to convince him to abandon that requirement.
There's no reason to assume that the insertion order is unknown,
actually; we don't _know_, so I'm content to go with what the OP did say.

AHS