Java Collection Framework
Java collection framework is a collection of interfaces and classes used to storing and processing a group of individual objects as a single unit. The java collection framework holds several classes that provide a large number of methods to store and process a group of objects. These classes make the programmer task super easy and fast.
Java collection framework was introduced in java 1.2 version.
Java collection framework has the following heirarchy.
Before the collection framework in java (before java 1.2 version), there was a set of classes like Array, Vector, Stack, HashTable. These classes are known as legacy classes.
The java collection framework contains List, Queue, Set, and Map as top-level interfaces. The List, Queue, and Set stores single value as its element, whereas Map stores a pair of a key and value as its element.
We discuss the individual interfaces and classes in the later tutorials of this series.