ArgumentMap

For this homework, you will create a class to parse command-line arguments and store them in a map. For example, consider the following command-line arguments:

"-a", "ant", "-b", "bee", "-b", "bat", "cat", "-d", "-e", "elk", "-f"

In this case, -a -b -d -e and -f are all flags since they start with a - dash followed by at least 1 letter character. The values are ant bee bat cat and elk since they do not start with a - and letter character.

Note that -42 is not a flag because the - dash is followed by a digit character. Instead it should be interpreted as a value representing a negative number.

Not all flags have values, not all values have associated flags, and values will be overwritten if there are repeated flags. For example, flag -a has value ant. Flag -b has initial value bee, but the value get replaced by the second occurrence of the -b flag with the value bat instead. The value cat has no associated flag and is ignored. The flags -d and -f have no associated value, but are still stored by the argument parser. The resulting map should look similar to:

{
  "-a" = "ant",
  "-b" = "bat",
  "-d" = null,
  "-e" = "elk",
  "-f" = null
}

Use an appropriate data structure to store the key/value pairs. The key/value pairs does not need to be stored in sorted order.

Avoid looping more often than necessary. For example, numFlags() should not require a loop.

Requirements

See the Javadoc and TODO comments in the template code in the src/main/java directory for additional details. You must pass the tests provided in the src/test/java directory. Do not modify any of the files in the src/test directory.

See the Homework Guides for additional details on homework requirements and submission.

Hints

Below are some hints that may help with this homework assignment:

• Many methods may be implemented with one line of code if you are familiar with the methods in HashMap or TreeMap.

• The parse(...) method is easier if you use a traditional for loop instead of an enhanced for loop.

• The String.codePointAt(int) and Character.isLetter(int) methods work with more languages than using String.charAt(int) and Character.isLetter(char) methods. However, it is not necessary to pass the tests.

These hints are optional. There may be multiple approaches to solving this homework.