collections - How to convert String into Hashmap in java

Question

How can I convert a String into a HashMap?

String value = "{first_name = naresh, last_name = kumar, gender = male}"

into

Map<Object, Object> = {
    first_name = naresh,
    last_name = kumar,
    gender = male
}

Where the keys are first_name, last_name and gender and the values are naresh, kumar, male.

Note: Keys can be any thing like city = hyderabad.

I am looking for a generic approach.

Answer 1

This is one solution. If you want to make it more generic, you can use the StringUtils library.

String value = "{first_name = naresh,last_name = kumar,gender = male}";
value = value.substring(1, value.length()-1);           //remove curly brackets
String[] keyValuePairs = value.split(",");              //split the string to creat key-value pairs
Map<String,String> map = new HashMap<>();               

for(String pair : keyValuePairs)                        //iterate over the pairs
{
    String[] entry = pair.split("=");                   //split the pairs to get key and value 
    map.put(entry[0].trim(), entry[1].trim());          //add them to the hashmap and trim whitespaces
}

For example you can switch

 value = value.substring(1, value.length()-1);

to

 value = StringUtils.substringBetween(value, "{", "}");

if you are using StringUtils which is contained in apache.commons.lang package.