Java arrays - can you name the keys?

Question

i have 1 function that declares 2 ArrayLists of type String. They are the same size and the values are related. Let's call them A & B.
I was hoping i could have my function return just 1 array, with the values of arraylist A being they keys of the returned array, and the values of arraylist B being the values in the returned array.
But can you name the elements of an array in java? in php you can, but in java, the only examples i have seen only use the standard #'s: 0, 1, 2, 3, etc. if you can, please post sample syntax.
i guess i could use a double scripted array, but... well i don't exactly know what the sytax would be for that in declaring the funciton.
if someone has a link of these kinds of examples / topics they could send me - that would be great too - i googled it but haven't really come across any.
thanks in advance

Answer 1

It appears as though what you are trying to do is associate a specific "key" value with another value. For example, let's say you want the word "dog" to be the key for the arraylist value of "bull dog."
The perfect data structure for this that Java provides is called a Map. Here is some sample code.
//create something called a HashMap where the first
//value is the key, and the second value is the value
//that the key is associated with
HashMap<String, String> map = new HashMap<String, String>();
//now, consider the previous example...
//here is the syntax for storing those values
map.put("dog", "bull dog");
//and this would be the syntax for getting a value
String value = map.get('dog");
//which would give "bull dog"
{code}
Hope that helps :)