When you read about the Java Collection Framework, you may assume there is something special about such an assemblage. Meanwhile, the word framework is quite overloaded and misused, as the word technology is one we have refused to use already. In the English language, the word framework means a basic structure underlying a system, concept, or text. In computer programming, a framework is a software system constructed so that its functionality can be customized by additional user-written code or configuration settings in order to fit the application-specific requirements.
But then we look closer into the content of the Java Collection Framework and realize that all its members belong to the java.util package, which is part of the Java Class Library, or Java standard library, as we have described it in the previous chapter. And, at the other extreme, the graphic...