Hey folks,

plugging away at a new program for class and I have run into a little snag, or rather a fairly major one for my pea sized brain. We are working on constructing a sorted linked listed that will store author names as well as a sorted book list for each author. The sorted book list will contain relevant information to books sales for that author and book. I believe I have properly set up my Node and sortedList classes and that the sorted list will function fine. My issue is with instantiating a sortedList with they type <Author> and being able to use my methods from the sortedList class as I populate the list. When I try to find and insert an author's name using my sortedList methods(line45) it says: find(Author) in SortedList can not be applied to (java.lang.string) I am concerned that I am missing some casting issue or something else and I am just plain stuck. Any advice would be helpful, with my current issue or just with my code in general. Anything that might help me advance a bit on the assignment and figure out my issue. Thanks.

import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.FileReader;
import java.io.BufferedReader;

public class Main<Author extends Comparable<Author>> {

private TextFileReader authorFile;
private Record currentRecord;
 String tempAuthor,tempAction, tempIsbn = "";
    int tempBooksSold,bookCount = 0;
    double tempRoyalty = 0.0;
     Author author;
    private Author authorName;


    public static void main (String args[])
        {
            (new Main()).ReadRecord ();
        }
    private void ReadRecord()
    {
         SortedList <Author> authorList = new SortedList<Author>();
         authorFile = new TextFileReader("bubbling.txt");

     //Loop to process book sales, remove or report records from the bubbling.txt file
  	while (authorFile.moreData())
    	{
           currentRecord = new Record (authorFile.readLine ());

           tempAuthor = currentRecord.getAuthor();
           tempIsbn = currentRecord.getIsbn();
           tempBooksSold = currentRecord.getBooksSold();
           tempRoyalty = currentRecord.getRoyalty();
           tempAction = currentRecord.getTransaction();


             System.out.println(tempAction);
             System.out.println(tempAuthor);
             System.out.println(tempIsbn);
             System.out.println(tempBooksSold);
             System.out.println(tempRoyalty);

            if (tempAction.equals("SAVE")){

                authorList.find(tempAuthor);
             //   authorList.insert(author);
            }
            if ( tempAction.equals("REPORT")){
              //  authorList.displayData();
            }
        } 
        authorList.displayData();
    }
}
class Node <TYPE extends Comparable<TYPE>>
{
         TYPE data;
          Node<TYPE>link;

               Node (TYPE newData, Node<TYPE> newLink)
               {
                      data=newData;
                      link=newLink;             
                }
}
class SortedList <TYPE extends Comparable<TYPE>>
{
     Node<TYPE> head, current, previous;

     {          head = new Node<TYPE> (null,null);
     }

     boolean find(TYPE search)
    // This method looks for search in the list. If found, current points to its node
    // and previous points to the node before. If not found, search could be inserted between previous
    // and current. True is returned if search is found.
     {
              previous = head;
              current= head.link;

          while(current!=null && current.data.compareTo(search)<0)
          {     previous =current;
               current=current.link;
          }

          return current!=null && current.data.compareTo(search) == 0;

     }
          void insert(TYPE newData)
          //This method inserts the newData into the list. It assumes that a find was executed to locate the
         // position of newData.
         {
               Node <TYPE> newNode = new Node<TYPE>(newData, current);

               previous.link = newNode;
               //Used to back up current so it points to the correct node.
               current= newNode;
          }

         void displayData(){
               findFirst();
                System.out.println("\nReport");
                System.out.println("----------------------");
              while(current!=null){
                System.out.println(current.data);
               findNext();
              }
         }
           void remove()
          //This method removes from the list the node pointed to by current. It assumes that a find was done to
         //locate the node.
          {
               previous.link = current.link;
               current = current.link;
          }
          void findFirst()
          //This method locates previous and current at the front of the list.
          {
               previous=head;
               current = head.link;
          }
           void findNext()
          //This method moves current and previous one node farther down the list.
         {
               previous = current;
               current =current.link;
          }
}

class Author implements Comparable<Author>
/*************************************************************************
* This constructor intializes the data fields with the string information
* provided by one line from the cars.txt file.
*************************************************************************/
{
    String authorName = "";
    SortedList<Book>bookList = new SortedList<Book>();

    public SortedList getBookList() {
        return bookList;
    }

    public void setBookList(SortedList <Book> bookList) {
        this.bookList = bookList;
    }

    public String getAuthorName() {
        return authorName;
    }

    public void setAuthorName(String authorName) {
        this.authorName = authorName;
    }

    public Author (String author)
    {
      // bookList = Book;
       authorName = author;
    }

     public int compareTo (Author other)
     {
          if ( authorName.equals(other.authorName))
              return authorName.compareTo(other.authorName);
          else return authorName.compareTo(other.authorName);
     }

} //end author class

/*************************************************************************
*Class for the members file information.
*************************************************************************/

class Book implements Comparable<Book>
{

    public void setIsbnNumber(String isbnNumber) {
        this.isbnNumber = isbnNumber;
    }
    public String getIsbnNumber() {
        return isbnNumber;
    }
     public void setNetRoyalty(double netRoyalty) {
        this.netRoyalty = netRoyalty;
    }
    public double getNetRoyalty() {
        return netRoyalty;
    }
     public void setBookSold(int booksSold) {
        this.booksSold = booksSold;

    }
    public int getBooksSold() {
        return booksSold;
    }
    String isbnNumber = "";
    int booksSold = 0;
    double netRoyalty = 0.00;

    public Book (String isbn, int quantity, double royalty)
    {
       isbnNumber = isbn;
       booksSold = quantity;
       netRoyalty = royalty;      
    }

     public int compareTo(Book other) {
           if (isbnNumber.equals(other.isbnNumber))
               return isbnNumber.compareTo(other.isbnNumber);
               else return isbnNumber.compareTo(other.isbnNumber);

}
}
class Record
/*************************************************************************
* This constructor intializes the data fields with the string information
* provided by one line from the cars.txt file.
*************************************************************************/
{
     public String getAuthor()
    {
        return author;
    }
     public String getTransaction()
    {
        return transaction;
    }
    public String getIsbn()
    {
        return isbn;
    }
    public int getBooksSold()
    {
        return booksSold;
    }
    public double getRoyalty()
    {
        return royalty;
    }
    

    String transaction = "";
    String author = "";
    String isbn = "";
    int booksSold = 0;
    double royalty = 0.0;

    public Record (String inputLine)
    {

        try
    {
        if (inputLine == null)
        {
        }
        else
        {
            transaction = inputLine.substring(0,6).trim();
            author = inputLine.substring(6,30).trim();
            isbn = inputLine.substring(30,43).trim();
            booksSold= Integer.parseInt(inputLine.substring(43,47).trim());
            royalty = Double.parseDouble(inputLine.substring(47,57).trim());
        }
    }
            catch( StringIndexOutOfBoundsException e )
  {
                    booksSold=0;
                    royalty=0.0;
  }
    }
 } //end author class
 //end book class

class TextFileReader
/***************************************************************************
* Class TextFileReader controls reading from a text file by opening the file,
*  reading one line at a time, keeping track
*  of the end of file, and handling I/O errors.
***************************************************************************/
  {
    private BufferedReader inputFile;
    private String fileName;
    private boolean dataLeft;

public TextFileReader (String name)
/***********************************************************************
* This constructor opens the file given by the name passed in the parameter.
***********************************************************************/
    {
     fileName = name;
        try
        {
            inputFile = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(fileName));
        }
        catch (IOException error)
        {
            error.printStackTrace();
            System.err.println ("An error occured opening file " + fileName + "!\n");
            System.exit(1);
        }
        dataLeft = true;
  } // end TextFileReader

public String readLine ()
/****************************************************************************
* This method reads and returns one line of the text file. if the file is
* empty, an empty string is returned.
****************************************************************************/
    {
    String inputLine;
    try
    {
        if ( (inputLine = inputFile.readLine()) == null )
            dataLeft = false;
        else return inputLine;
    }
    catch (IOException error)
    {
        System.err.println ("An error occured reading from file " + fileName +
                            "!\n");
        System.exit(1);
    }
    return null;
    }   // end readLine

public boolean moreData ()
/**************************************************************************
* This function returns true if the end has not
**************************************************************************/
  { return dataLeft; } // end moreData
    }// end class TextFileReader

The `find` of SortedList accepts an `Author` and you are passing it a `String` (line 45: tempAuthor is a String and not Author).

A few more things:
- IMO don't go overboard with generics; the driver class Main need not be generified
- Use standerdized notations for type-placeholders like T instead of names like TYPE; would be less confusing in the long run.

Thank you for the response. AS I worked on it last night I realized I was trying to pass it the wrong type. The issue I am having is I can not seem to properly create an Author object within the main class. When I try the compiler tells me that type parameter author can not be instantiated directly. Even if I simply do this it gives the error. Any ideas?

Author author = new Author();

This is related to the two points I mentioned in my previous post; the Author in the body of the Main class is treated as a type-holder and overshadows the actual Author type. This coupled with the point that you can't instantiate type variables is what is causing the problem here. Either remove the generic class declaration or change it to something logical like T.

Also, please post complete error messages with the corresponding line numbers instead of simply saying "it gives the error". Not many would have the time to copy your code and run it themselves.

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