Accessing member variable

Question

Hello techies,
Iam trying to access the member variables of an object which is added to arrayList.
I had 2 arrayLists.
Now i am converting it into Object[] using toArray()
Now iam comparing these two arraylists.
Now iam trying to access the memeber vairables of each object which is added to arraylist .
But iam unable to access the member variable of each object.
Object a[] = a1.toArray();
          Object b[] = a2.toArray();
          for (int i = 0; i < a.length; i++) {
               System.out.println("inside for loop");
               for (int j = 0; j < b.length; j++) {
// a.
                    int o = compareObjects.compare(a[i], b[j]);
                    System.out.println("returned value is" + o);
Here is my code::
import java.util.*;
import java.io.*;
import java.lang.*;
class exampleObject implements Comparator {
     String s = null;
     int i;
     int o;
     public exampleObject() {
     public exampleObject(int p, int q) {
          i = p;
          o = q;
     public int compare(Object o1, Object o2) {
          exampleObject k = (exampleObject) o1;
          exampleObject kk = (exampleObject) o2;
          // System.out.println("k.i"+k.i);
          // System.out.println("kk.i"+kk.i);
          if (k.i == kk.i) {
               System.out.println("inside if condition" + k.i);
               System.out.println("same i values");
               if (k.o == kk.o) {
                    System.out.println("kk.o");
               } else {
                    System.out.println("same p values");
                    return kk.o;
          return k.i;
class ArrayListObjectCompare {
     // public static BufferedReader readFile;
     public static exampleObject ex;
     public static void main(String args[]) {
          ArrayList a1 = new ArrayList();
          ArrayList a2 = new ArrayList();
          ex = new exampleObject(2, 3);
          exampleObject ex1 = new exampleObject(3, 4);
          exampleObject ex2 = new exampleObject(4, 5);
          exampleObject ex3 = new exampleObject(5, 6);
          exampleObject ex4 = new exampleObject(6, 7);
          a1.add(ex);
          a1.add(ex2);
          a1.add(ex4);
          a2.add(ex1);
          a2.add(ex3);
          exampleObject compareObjects = new exampleObject();
          Object a[] = a1.toArray();
          Object b[] = a2.toArray();
          for (int i = 0; i < a.length; i++) {
               System.out.println("inside for loop");
               for (int j = 0; j < b.length; j++) {
// a[i].k(-----here iam getting error);
                    int o = compareObjects.compare(a[i], b[j]);
                    System.out.println("returned value is" + o);
can any tell me how to access the member variable of each object which is added to arrayList.
I will be very thankful if any body replies or modifies my code.
thanks(inadvance),
ramu

Answer 1

I'm not sure if they work 100% correctly yet after the forum "upgrade" last week, but please use code tags (see button above posting box) when posting code.
You need to cast your Object back to exampleObject:
exampleObject myObj = (exampleObject)a[0];
System.out.println(myObj.i);Or, try using the other "toArray" overload:
exampleObject a[] = a1.toArray(new exampleObject[a1.size()]);Then your "a" array elements are already of class exampleObject, and you don't need to cast each element individually.