StringBuffer

This essay is about a suggested student project in Java programming. This essay gives a rough overview of how it might work. It does not describe an actual complete program. I have no source, object, specifications, file layouts or anything else useful to implementing this project. Everything I have to say to help you with this project is written below. I am not prepared to help you implement it; I have too many other projects of my own.

I do contract work for a living, which could include writing a program such as this. However, I don’t do people’s homework for them. That just robs them of an education.

You have my full permission to implement this project any way you please.

StringBuffer (and its single thread variant StringBuilder) is a poor cousin to String that allows changes to the String characters. It is missing all the search and substring methods. Since StringBuffer is final, you can’t simply add the necessary methods. Someone needs to write a completely new StringBuffer (and call it something like StringBuf). They should study Sun’s code for String and StringBuffer and implement a complete set of StringBuf methods based on Sun’s general techniques. The StringBuf class should not be final so that others can extend it still further. It might remember the String used to construct it, and simply hand that back later if no changes where made, rather than construct a new String. They might extend it with methods cannibalised from the Quoter Amanuensis. You also might take out the synchronisation to make it faster. See the LazyString project.

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