Hello all, I've just published a new extension to the standard Java Collections Framework to both GitHub and the Maven Central Repository, and am considering offering it up for possible inclusion in the Apache Commons Collections package.
The name of the class is "OrderedSet", which is an abbreviated version of its original working name, "CompositeKeyOrderedSet". As its previous working name suggests, an OrderedSet provides for composite-key based ordering of a set of values (analogous to composite-key ordering in a relational database). To get a better sense of what that actually means, the README text on the project's GitHub page provides a quick overview (or dive down into the source code on the GitHub page, if you prefer): https://github.com/dvimont/OrderedSet For more thorough end-user documentation, the project's Javadocs can be consulted: http://bit.ly/ordered-set I realize that "Apache Commons is a Commit-Then-Review community", but before I go through the steps of preparing a patch for submission I wanted to get some feedback, if possible, regarding whether this class would be appropriate for inclusion in the Apache Commons Collections package, and to be sure that its core functionality does not duplicate either (a) some already-existing component of the package or (b) some alternate, well-known (to all but me!) means of achieving automated composite-key-style ordering (in Java 1.6+). Thanks very much, Dan Vimont
