Exploring Immutable Arrays in Scala: A Deep Dive into Vectors
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M
Senior Software Engineer at Snowflake. Expert in scalable architecture, cloud tech, and security. Passionate problem-solver and mentor.
Scala Array is not located in the scala.collection.mutable package, however, they are in fact mutable
val arr = Array(1,2,3)
arr(1) = 3
println(arr.mkString(",")) // 1,3,3
Immutable alternative to Scala Array is Scala Vector
val arr = Vector(1,2,3)
println(arr.updated(1,3).mkString(",")) // 1,3,3
println(arr.mkString(",")) // 1,2,3 because original array remains unchanged
Vector provides O(1) asymptotic time complexity prepend, append, random read, random write operations
Most important methods of Vector class:
| Method | Description |
| vector.update(index, V) | random write, returns a new vector with an updated value V at the specified index |
| vector(index) | random read, returns a value of the index element |
| vector.prepended(V) | returns a new vector with prepended value V |
| vector.appended(v) | returns a new vector with appended value V |