print out an arraylist

[dellacpa]

Hi, I am working on a simulation model for fish.

My model has a class called SpawningGround which contains an Arraylist<Fish>. (So in other words a SpawningGround is composed of a lot of Fish)

What I would like to know is the following. What code/classes do I need in order to save as a csv or a txt file the arraylist<Fish> for each one of my spawningGrounds?

(PS: each line of the ArrayList<Fish> represents an individual fish, and each column of the array a proprety of the fish)

Thanks for your help,
Patrick

[Norm]

What code/classes do I need in order to save as a csv or a txt file the arraylist<Fish> for each one of my spawningGrounds?

You could write the contents of each ArrayList to its own text file. Each line in the text file would have all the data for an entry/object in the ArrayList.
Add two methods to the object:
1) to create a line for the text file that contains the data for a fish
2) A constructor that takes a line from the text file and creates the fish object.

[dellacpa]

Norm,
thanks for the answer, but I am really new to Java. Do you have an example of a code that I could use?

[Norm]

Can you post your code for the Fish class?
Sample method to create line to write to file:

final String SepChar = "|";  // field separater
 
// Fish has two properties: name and type

String createRecord() {
  return name + SepChar + type;  // build string with the Fish's properties
}
//Sample constructor:
Fish(String str) {  // parse record created by the createRecord method
  int ix = str.indexOf(SepChar);
  name = str.substring(0, ix);
  type = str.substring(ix+1);
}

This code is off the top of my head and may not compile or execute correctly.
It is intended as an example only