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Comparing two lists of class objects similar to a Diff Tool

Question moved here.
My requirement is to write a program that sort of mimics diff tools. Yes there are quite a few libraries and open source code that accomplishes this purpose, but I would like to write my own comparer.
Here's the starting point. I have a class called DataItem which looks like this:
public class DataItem
{
public DataItem() { }
public DataItem(string d, string v) { Data = d; Value = v; }
public string Data { get; set; }
public string Value { get; set; }
}
I have two lists of these class objects, let's call them PRE and POST and take some example values as follows. 'Data' part will be unique in a list.
preList: (Data,Value)
AAA,0
BBB,1
CCC,3
DDD,4
FFF,0
GGG,3
postList: (Data,Value)
AAA,0
BBB,2
DDD,4
EEE,9
FFF,3
Think of PRE as the original list, and POST as the list after some changes done. I would like to compare the two, and categorize them into three categories:
Added Items - An item with a new 'Data' added to the list.
Removed Items - An item was removed from the list.
Diff Items - 'Data' is found in both PRE and POST lists, but their corresponding 'Value' is different.
So when categorized they should look like this:
Added Items:
EEE,9
Removed Items:
CCC,3
GGG,3
Diff Items:
BBB
FFF
I have another DiffItem class, to objects of which I would like to put the final results. DiffItem looks like this:
public class DiffItem
{
public DiffItem() { }
public DiffItem(string data, string type, string pre, string post) { Data = data; DiffType = type; PreVal = pre; PostVal = post; }
public string Data { get; set; }
public string DiffType { get; set; } // DiffType = Add/Remove/Diff
public string PreVal { get; set; } // preList value corresponding to Data item
public string PostVal { get; set; } // postList value corresponding to Data item
}
To accomplish this, first I extended IEqualityComparer and wrote a couple of comparers:
public class DataItemComparer : IEqualityComparer<DataItem>
{
public bool Equals(DataItem x, DataItem y)
{
return (string.Equals(x.Data, y.Data) && string.Equals(x.Value, y.Value));
}
public int GetHashCode(DataItem obj)
{
return obj.Data.GetHashCode();
}
}
public class DataItemDataComparer : IEqualityComparer<DataItem>
{
public bool Equals(DataItem x, DataItem y)
{
return string.Equals(x.Data, y.Data);
}
public int GetHashCode(DataItem obj)
{
return obj.Data.GetHashCode();
}
}
Then used Except() and Intersect() methods as follows:
static void DoDiff()
{
diffList = new List<DiffItem>();
IEnumerable<DataItem> preOnly = preList.Except(postList, new DataItemComparer());
IEnumerable<DataItem> postOnly = postList.Except(preList, new DataItemComparer());
IEnumerable<DataItem> common = postList.Intersect(preList, new DataItemComparer());
IEnumerable<DataItem> added = postOnly.Except(preOnly, new DataItemDataComparer());
IEnumerable<DataItem> removed = preOnly.Except(postOnly, new DataItemDataComparer());
IEnumerable<DataItem> diffPre = preOnly.Intersect(postOnly, new DataItemDataComparer());
IEnumerable<DataItem> diffPost = postOnly.Intersect(preOnly, new DataItemDataComparer());
foreach (DataItem add in added)
{
diffList.Add(new DiffItem(add.Data, "Add", null, add.Value));
}
foreach (DataItem rem in removed)
{
diffList.Add(new DiffItem(rem.Data, "Remove", rem.Value, null));
}
foreach (DataItem pre in diffPre)
{
DataItem post = diffPost.First(x => x.Data == pre.Data);
diffList.Add(new DiffItem(pre.Data, "Diff", pre.Value, post.Value));
}
}
This does work and gets the job done. But I'm wondering if there's a 'better' way to do this. Note that I put quotes around the word 'better', because I don't have a proper definition for what would make this better. Perhaps is there a way to get this done without as many 'foreach' loops and use of Except() and Intersetc(), since I would imagine that behind the Linq there's quite a bit of iterations going on.
Simply put, is there a cleaner code that I can write for this? I'm asking mostly out of academic interest and to expand my knowledge.

I don't think you need your IEqualityComparer:
var added = from a in postList
where !preList.Any(b => b.Data == a.Data)
select new DiffItem(a.Data, "Add", null, a.Value);
var removed = from b in preList
where !postList.Any(a => a.Data == b.Data)
select new DiffItem(b.Data, "Remove", b.Value, null);
var diff = from b in preList
join a in postList on b.Data equals a.Data
where b.Value != a.Value
select new DiffItem(b.Data, "Diff", b.Data, a.Data);
var diffList = added.ToList();
diffList.AddRange(removed);
diffList.AddRange(diff);

ArrayList with Multiple Values c#

I am unsure whether this is possible with an ArrayList or a Dictionary or whether it would be something else, if so I wonder where you could point me in the right direction...
Can you have an ArrayList with Multiple Values i.e.
ArrayList weather = new ArrayList();
weather.Add("Sunny", "img/sunny.jpg");
weather.Add("Rain", "img/Rain.jpg);
To then assign to controls like below.
if (WeatherValue = 0)
{
Label1.Text = weather[0].ToString;
Image1.ImageUrl = weather[0].ToString;
}
Or can I do this with a Dictionary
Dictionary<string, string> dict = new Dictionary<string, string>();
dict.Add("Cloudy", "../img/icons/w0.png"); //[0]
dict.Add("Rain", "../img/icons/w1.png"); //[1]
Label1.Text = dict[0].VALUE1; //So this would get Cloudy
Image.ImageUrl = dict[0].VALUE2; //This would get ../img/w0.png
How do you call the values of a dictionary separately using [0], and [1] ? etc

There's no reason to still use ArrayList, use the System.Collections.Generic.List<T>-class. Then you keep compile time safety and you don't need to cast everything.
In this case you should create a custom class:
public class Weather
{
public double Degree { get; set; }
public string Name { get; set; }
public string IconPath { get; set; }
public override string ToString()
{
return Name;
}
}
Then you can use this readable and maintainable code:
List<Weather> weatherList = new List<Weather>();
weatherList.Add(new Weather { Name = "Sunny", IconPath = "img/sunny.jpg" });
weatherList.Add(new Weather { Name = "Rain", IconPath = "img/Rain.jpg" });
if (WeatherValue == 0) // whatever that is
{
Label1.Text = weatherList[0].Name;
Image1.ImageUrl = weatherList[0].IconPath;
}
Update: according to your edited question. A dictionary doesn't make much sense because you can't access it via index(it has no order) but only via key. Since that would be the weather-name you have to know it beforehand. But it seems that you don't have it.
So either loop all key-value pairs in the dictionary and use the key for the name and the value for the path or simply use a real class which would be much better.
If you don't want to create a class there's only one thing that comes to my mind, the Tuple:
List<Tuple<string, string>> weatherList = new List<string, string>();
weatherList.Add(Tuple.Create("Sunny", "img/sunny.jpg"));
weatherList.Add(Tuple.Create("Rain", "img/Rain.jpg"));
if (WeatherValue == 0) // whatever that is
{
Label1.Text = weatherList[0].Item1;
Image1.ImageUrl = weatherList[0].Item2;
}

You can use a Dictionary
Dictionary<string, string> weather = new Dictionary<string, string>();
values.Add("Sunny", "img/sunny.jpg");
values.Add("Rain", "img/Rain.jpg");
The simplest way to call element in a dictionnary is using foreach loop
foreach (var pair in weather )
{
Console.WriteLine("{0}, {1}",pair.Key,pair.Value);
}

Why isn't my object being updated

I'm doing something wrong because after the loop executed myData still contains objects with blank ids. Why isn't the myData object being updated in the following foreach loop, and how do I fix it?
I thought it could be that I wasn't passing the object by reference, but added a ref keyword and also moved to the main method and I'm still showing the object not being updated.
Additional Information
The user object in the foreach loop is being updated, but the myData list does not reflect the updates I see being applied to the user object.
** Solution **
I was not creating a List but an Enumerable which was pulling the json each time I went through myData in a foreach list. Adding a ToList() fixed my issue.
public class MyData
{
public string ID { get; set; }
public Dictionary<string, string> Properties { get; set; }
}
int index = 0;
// Does not allow me to up, creates an IEnumerable
//IEnumerable<MyData> myData = JObject.Parse(json)["Users"]
// .Select(x => new MyData()
// {
// ID = x["id"].ToString(),
// Properties = x.OfType<JProperty>()
// .ToDictionary(y => y.Name, y => y.Value.ToString())
// });
//Works allows me to update the resulting list.
IEnumerable<MyData> myData = JObject.Parse(json)["Users"]
.Select(x => new MyData()
{
ID = x["id"].ToString(),
Properties = x.OfType<JProperty>()
.ToDictionary(y => y.Name, y => y.Value.ToString())
}).ToList();
foreach (var user in myData) // Also tried myData.ToList()
{
if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(user.ID))
{
user.ID = index.ToString();
user.Properties["id"] = index.ToString();
}
index++;
}

public class MyData
{
public MyData()
{
this.Properties = new Dictionary<string,string>();
}
public string ID { get; set; }
public Dictionary<string, string> Properties { get; set; }
}
public static void Main(string[] args)
{
IEnumerable<MyData> myDataList = new List<MyData>();
int index = 0; // Assuming your starting point is 0
foreach (var obj in myDataList)
{
if (obj != null && string.IsNullOrEmpty(obj.ID))
{
obj.ID = index.ToString();
// Checks if the Properties dictionary has the key "id"
if (obj.Properties.ContainsKey("id"))
{
// If it does, then update it
obj.Properties["id"] = obj.ID;
}
else
{
// Else add it to the dictionary
obj.Properties.Add("id", obj.ID);
}
}
index++;
}
I believe the reason why your objects are not updating because it's probably still referring to the memory block before your objects were changed. Perhaps. The easiest way (that I can think of, there are thousands of smarter programmers than me) is to create a new list and have it contain all of your updated objects.
Edit
I updated the code above with the code that I have. I created a method to set a small amount of objects to test:
private static IEnumerable<MyData> GetMyData()
{
return new List<MyData>()
{
new MyData(),
new MyData() {ID = "2"},
new MyData() {ID = "3"},
new MyData()
};
}
I was able to view my changes and then go through a foreach loop to view my changes. If the ID of the object is Null or Empty, then it steps into the if check and adds the current index to the ID as you know.
Now for my question: Which "id" is blank? The "id" in the dictionary or is it the ID of the model? Are all of your (Model).ID blank? As the updated code of yours, if your dictionary doesn't have "id" as a key, it's going to throw an exception saying it doesn't exist so you will need to do a check to make sure it does exist or add it if it doesn't.

Storing 2 columns into a List

How can I store data from 2 columns (from a database) in a List
List<string> _items = new List<string>();
Any help is appreciated

You create a class that will represent a row with 2 columns:
public class Foo
{
// obviously you find meaningful names of the 2 properties
public string Column1 { get; set; }
public string Column2 { get; set; }
}
and then you store in a List<Foo>:
List<Foo> _items = new List<Foo>();
_items.Add(new Foo { Column1 = "bar", Column2 = "baz" });

Use a tuple struct like KeyValuePair
List<KeyValuePair<string, string>> _items = new List<KeyValuePair<string, string>>();
_items.Add(new KeyValuePair<string, string>(foo, bar));

I would use a class
List<MyDataClass> _items = new List<MyDataClass>();
public class MyDataClass
{
public string Value1 { get; set; }
public string Value2 { get; set; }
}

You can either create a new class to hold the data, Or you could use the built in Tuple<> class. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.tuple.aspx
Also if one of the columns contains a unique ID of some sort, you could also consider using a Dictionary<>.

It's about how to retrieve the data from the new two columns list
List<ListTwoColumns> JobIDAndJobName = new List<ListTwoColumns>();
for (int index = 0; index < JobIDAndJobName.Count;index++)
{
ListTwoColumns List = JobIDAndJobName[index];
if (List.Text == this.cbJob.Text)
{
JobID = List.ID;
}
}

I know this question is pretty old and by now you probably got your answer and have figured out what you need but I wanted to add something that might help someone in the future.
The best current answer is frankly from #csharptest.net but it has a serious performance drawback and so here is my approach a la his answer based on a suggestion to use Dictionary<TKey, TValue>
private Dictionary<string, string> _items = new Dictionary<string, string>();
// if you need to check to see if it exists already or not
private void AddToList(string one, string two)
{
if (!_items.ContainsKey(one))
_items.Add(one, two);
}
// you can simplify the add further
private void AddToList(string one, string two)
{
_items[one] = two;
// note if you try to add and it exists, it will throw exception,
// so alternatively you can wrap it in try/catch - dealer's choice
}

you can also make array of list
List<string> [] list= new List<String> [];
list[0]=new List<string>();
list[1]=new List<string>();
list[0].add("hello");
list[1].add("world");

You could do this:
List<IList<string>> cols = new List<IList<string>>();
You can set how many columns you want.
cols.Add(new List<string> { "", "", "","more","more","more","more","..." });

Best way to implement "ReOrderable Collection" and Persist it to database

My domain object :
public class MyDomainObject
{
public Guid Id { get; set; }
public string Name { get; set; }
public int DisplayOrder { get; set; }
}
Assuming sample data :
var list = new List<MyDomainObject>()
{
new MyDomainObject {Name = "Element1", DisplayOrder = 0},
new MyDomainObject {Name = "Element2", DisplayOrder = 1},
new MyDomainObject {Name = "Element3", DisplayOrder = 2},
new MyDomainObject {Name = "Element4", DisplayOrder = 3},
};
Now i change the DisplayOrder of the "Element3" from 2 to 1. My list should looks like that :
Element1 (DisplayOrder = 0)
Element3 (DisplayOrder = 1)
Element2 (DisplayOrder = 2)
Element4 (DisplayOrder = 3)
Now i remove "Element3"
Element1 (DisplayOrder = 0)
Element2 (DisplayOrder = 1)
Element4 (DisplayOrder = 2)
So what's the best way to persist this mechanism to database ?
Basically i need a "ReOrderableCollection" which will be populated from database with an OrderBy "DisplayOrder" where Collection Index Match "DisplayOrder", and persist back items by assigning DisplayOrder from Collection Index.

I answered a previous/similar question about re-ordering here:
How to design table that can be re-sequenced?
This does a good job of resaving the Order with no gaps. Depending on the size the lists resaving the Order may be a perfectly viable option, for long lists Mark Byers' idea looks pretty good.

From your examples it seems that you always want the sequence to be without gaps, starting from zero. But this means that removing the first element will require updating the row in the database for every single item in your list. It's simple and it will work (and these are good things) but it's not always ideal. Since you asked for "the best way" without really specifying what you mean by that, allow me to suggest an alternative method:
What really matters with a DisplayOrder is not the actual values but their relative order. If you want to improve performance with the database, you could consider relaxing the requirement that there should be no gaps and then try to find the smallest number of changes to the DisplayOrders to ensure that the correct order is stored, even if gaps are present in the resulting sequence. If you do this then adding, removing or moving a single item will typically only require updating one row in the database, with the exception that occasionally other items will have to be moved to create a gap where an item must be inserted between two others that have consecutive DisplayOrders.
You can also minimize the number of times that a gap is not available by starting with DisplayOrder 100, 200, 300 and later allowing for example an insertion with DisplayOrder 150 in between (or perhaps use a real/float type instead of an integer).
Another advantage of this method is if you use a database data comparison tool to observe changes between the current version of the database and older versions it will be easier to see what modifications have been made to the display order. You will only see changes in the display order of items that have actually been moved by the user, rather than half the list change each time an item is removed. It will also reduce the size of backups if you use an incremental backup strategy.
I'd say though that these advantages are not significant advantages over the naive method for most cases. It depends on your system whether it is worth implementing this system or just keeping it simple. If in doubt, keep it simple. For systems with small lists, few modifications and where you don't care about the change history, overwriting the entire list with new DisplayOrders each time will probably be just fine.

For what I can see it seems that DisplayOrder has the same value of the index property of the collection. So I will try to use that instead of a DisplayOrder property. On the DB I will use the DisplayOrder column to read and save the items but not on the domain objects.
HTH
ema

Now I'm assuming that you do want to always reorganize your list so that the DisplayOrder starts at 0 and increases without gaps, and you want this to happen automatically. You could implement your own collection type and an interface IDisplayOrderable and have the members of your type that change the list also automaticaly update the DisplayOrder of the items in the collection. As opposed to my other answer which was about an alternative way to store the data in the datase, this answer shows how to write a client class that could make it easier to automatically synchronize the DisplayOrder in your objects with your list indexes so that when you are ready to submit the changes to the database, the DisplayOrder field is already set correctly for you.
I think the answer is best given as some source code:
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
interface IDisplayOrderable
{
int DisplayOrder { get; set; }
}
class ReorderableList<T> : IList<T> where T : IDisplayOrderable
{
List<T> list = new List<T>();
private void updateDisplayOrders()
{
int displayOrder = 0;
foreach (T t in list)
{
t.DisplayOrder = displayOrder++;
}
}
public ReorderableList() { }
public ReorderableList(IEnumerable<T> items)
{
list = new List<T>(items.OrderBy(item => item.DisplayOrder));
}
public void Insert(int index, T item)
{
list.Insert(index, item);
updateDisplayOrders();
}
public void Add(T item)
{
list.Add(item);
updateDisplayOrders();
}
public bool Remove(T item)
{
bool result = list.Remove(item);
if (result)
updateDisplayOrders();
return result;
}
public IEnumerator<T> GetEnumerator()
{
return list.GetEnumerator();
}
// TODO: Other members and methods required to implement IList<T>...
}
class Item : IDisplayOrderable
{
public string Name { get; set; }
public int DisplayOrder { get; set; }
}
class Program
{
static void Main()
{
Item foo = new Item { Name = "foo", DisplayOrder = 0 };
Item bar = new Item { Name = "bar", DisplayOrder = 1 };
Item baz = new Item { Name = "baz", DisplayOrder = 2 };
// Pretend this came from the database.
IEnumerable<Item> query = new Item[] { bar, foo };
// The constructor automatically reorder the elements.
ReorderableList<Item> items = new ReorderableList<Item>(query);
items.Add(baz);
items.Remove(foo);
items.Insert(1, foo);
foreach (Item item in items)
Console.WriteLine("{0} : {1}", item.Name, item.DisplayOrder);
}
}
Output:
bar : 0
foo : 1
baz : 2
Perhaps this was the sort of answer you were looking for?

I maybe founded a solution by creating a custom List which take an Lamba Expression in constructor parameter in order the list to be able to self update items property "DisplayOrder".
The sample class
public class MyItem
{
public string Name { get; set; }
public int DisplayOrder { get; set; }
}
The sample program
public class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
var list = new DisplayOrderableList<MyItem>(p => p.DisplayOrder)
{
new MyItem{ Name = "Item 1"},
new MyItem{ Name = "Item 2"},
new MyItem{ Name = "Item 3"},
};
var item = list.Where(p => p.Name == "Item 2").FirstOrDefault();
list.MoveUp(item);
list.ForEach(p => Console.WriteLine("{0}-{1}", p.Name, p.DisplayOrder));
Console.WriteLine();
list.MoveDown(item);
list.ForEach(p => Console.WriteLine("{0}-{1}", p.Name, p.DisplayOrder));
Console.WriteLine();
Console.ReadLine();
}
}
The custom implementation of DisplayOrderableList
public class DisplayOrderableList<T> : List<T>
{
#region Private Fields
private PropertyInfo _property;
#endregion
#region Constructors
public DisplayOrderableList(Expression<Func<T, int>> expression)
{
ValidateExpression(expression);
}
#endregion
#region Public Methods
public void MoveUp(T item)
{
if (!Contains(item))
throw new ArgumentNullException("item", "item doesn't exists in collection");
var idx = IndexOf(item);
RemoveAt(idx);
if (idx > 0)
Insert(idx - 1, item);
else
Insert(0, item);
UpdateDisplayOrder();
}
public void MoveDown(T item)
{
if (!Contains(item))
throw new ArgumentNullException("item", "item doesn't exists in collection");
var idx = IndexOf(item);
RemoveAt(idx);
if (idx + 1 > Count)
Add(item);
else
Insert(idx + 1, item);
UpdateDisplayOrder();
}
#endregion
#region Private Methods
private void UpdateDisplayOrder()
{
foreach (var item in this)
{
_property.SetValue(item, IndexOf(item), null);
}
}
#endregion
#region Expression Methods
private void ValidateExpression(Expression<Func<T, int>> expression)
{
var lamba = ToLambaExpression(expression);
var propInfo = ToPropertyInfo(lamba);
if (!propInfo.CanWrite)
{
throw new ArgumentException(String.Format("Property {0} as no setters", propInfo.Name));
}
_property = propInfo;
}
private static LambdaExpression ToLambaExpression(Expression expression)
{
var lambda = expression as LambdaExpression;
if (lambda == null)
{
throw new ArgumentException("Invalid Expression");
}
var convert = lambda.Body as UnaryExpression;
if (convert != null && convert.NodeType == ExpressionType.Convert)
{
lambda = Expression.Lambda(convert.Operand, lambda.Parameters.ToArray());
}
return lambda;
}
private static PropertyInfo ToPropertyInfo(LambdaExpression expression)
{
if (expression == null)
{
throw new ArgumentNullException("expression", "Expression cannot be null.");
}
var prop = expression.Body as MemberExpression;
if (prop == null)
{
throw new ArgumentException("Invalid expression");
}
var propInfo = prop.Member as PropertyInfo;
if (propInfo == null)
{
throw new ArgumentException("Invalid property");
}
return propInfo;
}
#endregion
}
This now get the following output :
Item 2-0
Item 1-1
Item 3-2
Item 1-0
Item 2-1
Item 3-2
It's a proof of concept and should be enhanced but it's a beggining.
What do you think about this ?

I know this is a old question, but the comments here and in another question helped me solve a similar issue and I wanted to provide my code in case it helps anyone else out looking for something similar. You can find my code at the following link:
How to design table that can be re-sequenced?