Java 8 multiple mapping

Question

Is it possible perform multiple mapping on collection? Following code compilation error:

... in Stream cannot be applied to java.util.function.Function<capture<?>,capture<?>>

private static List<?> multipleMapping(final Collection<?> collection, final List<Function<?, ?>> functions) {
    Stream<?> stream = collection.stream();
    for (Function<?, ?> function : functions) {
        stream = stream.map(function);
    }
    return stream.collect(Collectors.toList());
}

I would like to generic solution.

Answer 1

The problem comes from the fact that you're using a generic wildcard ?. What you want is to have a parameterized type T, that will represent the type of the Stream element. Assuming the function would return the same type as their input, you could have:

private static <T> List<T> multipleMapping(final Collection<T> collection, final List<Function<T, T>> functions) {
    Stream<T> stream = collection.stream();
    for (Function<T, T> function : functions) {
        stream = stream.map(function);
    }
    return stream.collect(Collectors.toList());
}

This compiles fine: the mapper given to map correcly accepts a T and returns a T. However, if the functions don't return the same type as their input then you won't be able to keep type-safety and will have to resort to using List<Function<Object, Object>>.

---

Note that we could use a UnaryOperator<T> instead of Function<T, T>.

Also, you could avoid the for loop and reduce all functions into a single one using andThen:

private static <T> List<T> multipleMapping(final Collection<T> collection, final List<Function<T, T>> functions) {
    return collection.stream()
                     .map(functions.stream().reduce(Function.identity(), Function::andThen))
                     .collect(Collectors.toList());
}