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Hashed value without hashCode definition

ID: java/hashing-without-hashcode
Kind: problem
Security severity: 
Severity: error
Precision: very-high
Tags:
   - reliability
   - correctness
Query suites:
   - java-security-and-quality.qls

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Classes that define an equals method but no hashCode method can lead to unexpected results if instances of those classes are stored in a hashing data structure. Hashing data structures expect that hash codes fulfill the contract that two objects that equals considers equal should have the same hash code. This contract is likely to be violated by such classes.

Recommendation

Every class that implements a custom equals method should also provide an implementation of hashCode.

Example

In the following example, class Point has no implementation of hashCode. Calling hashCode on two distinct Point objects with the same coordinates would probably result in different hash codes. This would violate the contract of the hashCode method, in which case objects of type Point should not be stored in hashing data structures.

class Point {
    int x;
    int y;

    Point(int x, int y) {
        this.x = x;
        this.y = y;
    }

    public boolean equals(Object o) {
    	if (!(o instanceof Point)) return false;
    	Point q = (Point)o;
    	return x == q.x && y == q.y;
    }
}

In the modification of the above example, the implementation of hashCode for class Point is suitable because the hash code is computed from exactly the same fields that are considered in the equals method. Therefore, the contract of the hashCode method is fulfilled.

class Point {
    int x;
    int y;

    Point(int x, int y) {
        this.x = x;
        this.y = y;
    }

    public boolean equals(Object o) {
        if (!(o instanceof Point)) return false;
        Point q = (Point)o;
        return x == q.x && y == q.y;
    }

    // Implement hashCode so that equivalent points (with the same values of x and y) have the
    // same hash code
    public int hashCode() {
        int hash = 7;
        hash = 31*hash + x;
        hash = 31*hash + y;
        return hash;
    }
}

References

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