java - Map implementation with duplicate keys

Question

I want to have a map with duplicate keys.

I know there are many map implementations (Eclipse shows me about 50), so I bet there must be one that allows this. I know it's easy to write your own map that does this, but I would rather use some existing solution.

Maybe something in commons-collections or google-collections?

Answer 1

You are searching for a multimap, and indeed both commons-collections and Guava have several implementations for that. Multimaps allow for multiple keys by maintaining a collection of values per key, i.e. you can put a single object into the map, but you retrieve a collection.

If you can use Java 5, I would prefer Guava's Multimap as it is generics-aware.