Question

I am creating a new board obtained by exchanging two adjacent blocks in the same row on an original board. The problem is that the new board overrides the content of the original board.

For example:

 int[][] origBoard = { { 0, 4, 6 }, {  5, 3, 1 }, { 2, 8, 7 } };
 int[][] twinBoard = { { 0, 6, 4 }, { 5, 3, 1 }, { 2, 8, 7 } };

What happens is that the origBoard becomes the same as the twinBoard when I assert the following:

 Board B = new Board(origBoard);
 Board b = B.twin();
 assertFalse("Calling twin() modifies the original Board.", B.equals(b));

My code is as follows:

public class Board {

    private int[][] goalBoard;

    private final Node node;

    private class Node {
        private int[][] board;
        private int move;
        private Node next;
    }

    // construct a board from an N-by-N array of blocks
    // (where blocks[i][j] = block in row i, column j)
    public Board(int[][] blocks) {
        int N = blocks.length;

        goalBoard = new int[N][N];
        for (int i = 0; i < dimension(); i++) {
            for (int j = 0; j < dimension(); j++) {
                if (i == N - 1 && j == N - 1) {
                    goalBoard[i][j] = 0;
                } else {
                    goalBoard[i][j] = N * i + (j + 1);
                }
            }
        }

        // initial node
        node = new Node();
        node.board = blocks;
        node.move = 0;
        node.next = null;
    }

    // board dimension N
    public int dimension() {
        return goalBoard.length;
    }

    // a board obtained by exchanging two adjacent blocks in the same row
    public Board twin() {
        int[][] testBoardATwin = new int[dimension()][dimension()];
        testBoardATwin = node.board;
        int x = node.board[0][0];
        int y = node.board[0][1];

        // DEFAULT
        if (x != 0 && y != 0) {
            testBoardATwin[0][0] = y;
            testBoardATwin[0][1] = x;
        }
        // 2x2
        if (dimension() == 2 || y == 0) {
            if (x == 0 || y == 0) {
                x = node.board[1][0];
                y = node.board[1][1];
                testBoardATwin[1][1] = x;
                testBoardATwin[1][0] = y;
            }
        } else {
            if (x == 0) {
                testBoardATwin[0][1] = node.board[0][2];
                testBoardATwin[0][2] = y;
            }
        }

        Board board = new Board(testBoardATwin);
        return board;
    }

    // does this board equal y?
    public boolean equals(Object y) {
        Board testBoard = (Board) y;
        if (testBoard == null) {
            return false;
        }
        for (int i = 0; i < dimension(); i++) {
            for (int j = 0; j < dimension(); j++) {
                if (testBoard.node.board[i][j] != node.board[i][j]) {
                    return false;
                }
            }
        }
        return true;
    }

}

What am i doing wrong? Please help.
Thank you.

Answer 1

node = new Node();
node.board = blocks;

And same tricky place here in Board constructor. You not copying your input array but assigning a reference to a class member property.