Question

Possible Duplicate:
Sorted ArrayList not displaying?

Code:

  String title1 = "Original Order\n\n";
  String title2 = "Sorted Order\n\n";

  String collection = "";
  for (int i = 0; i < cdcollection.size(); i++)  {
  collection = collection + cdcollection.get(i);
  }
  mainTextArea.setText(title1 + collection);


  Collections.sort(cdcollection);

  String temp = "";
  for (int j = 0; j < cdcollection.size(); j++)  {
  temp += cdcollection.get(j);
  }
  mainTextArea.setText(title2 + temp);

Answer 1

I took your code without the swing code and the list is sorted properly. See the code below

public static void main(String[] args){
    ArrayList<String> cdcollection = new ArrayList();
    Collections.addAll(cdcollection, "renier\n", "mert\n", "rain\n",
            "mylen", "dreb\n");

    String title1 = "Original Order\n\n";
    String title2 = "Sorted Order\n\n";

    String collection = "";
    for (int i = 0; i < cdcollection.size(); i++) {
        collection = collection + cdcollection.get(i);
    }
    System.out.println(title1 + collection);

    Collections.sort(cdcollection);
    System.out.println(cdcollection);
}

The for loop you used here

 for (int j = 0; j < cdcollection.size(); j++)  {
      mainTextArea.setText(title2 + collection.get(j));
 }

Dont add the title2 in the loop and calling setText in loop will over write the old text. Append all the string from the list in a temp string and in the last set in the in the mainTextArea. Something like

 String temp = "";
 for (int j = 0; j < cdcollection.size(); j++)  {
      temp += cdcollection.get(j));
 }
 mainTextArea.setText(title2 + temp);

But this is definitely a duplicate as mentioned by Alexander. you could have edited the same question.