Printing a 2D ArrayList in Java returns the length on one line

Question

I need to print a 2D ArrayList. I have it set up like this:

static ArrayList <Employee> employeeList = new ArrayList <>();

public static class Employee extends Object {
    //Attributes
    String id, firstName, lastName, annualSalary, startDate;

    //Constructor
    public Employee(String id, String firstName, String lastName, String annualSalary, String startDate) {
        this.id = id;
        this.firstName = firstName;
        this.lastName = lastName;
        this.annualSalary = annualSalary;
        this.startDate = startDate;
    }

    //Getters or Accessors
    public String getId() {
        return id;
    }
    public String getFirstName() {
        return firstName;
    }
    public String getLastName() {
        return lastName;
    }
    public String getAnnualSalary() {
        return annualSalary;
    }
    public String getStartDate() {
        return startDate;
    }

    @Override
    public String toString() {
      return id + " " + firstName + " " + lastName + " " + annualSalary + " " + startDate;
    }
}
...

public static void printArrayList() {
    for (int x=0; x<employeeList.size(); x++) {
        for (int y=0; y<=0; y++) {
            System.out.print(employeeList);
        }
        System.out.print ("\n \n");
    }
}

When I do this, if there is one element in the list it prints:

[12345 john henry 100000 01/01/2000]

However, when I have 2 elements, it prints:

[12345 john henry 100000 01/01/2000, 67890 frank longman 125000 12/31/1999]

[12345 john henry 100000 01/01/2000, 67890 frank longman 125000 12/31/1999]

When there are 2 elements, I want it to print:

[12345 john henry 100000 01/01/2000]

[67890 frank longman 125000 12/31/1999]

How do I fix this?

Answer 1

First, that's not a 2D ArrayList, a 2D ArrayList would look like ArrayList<ArrayList<Employee>>. You are printing the entire list every iteration instead of one item each. Also, you can use System.out.println() instead of System.out.print() to add a new line after every print:

public static void printArrayList() {
    for (int i = 0; x < employeeList.size(); i++) {
        System.out.println(employeeList.get(i));
    }
}

If you want to add an empty line between every print yo can modify previous method to:

public static void printArrayList() {
    for (int i = 0; x < employeeList.size(); i++) {
        System.out.println(employeeList.get(i) + System.lineSeparator());
    }
}

If you want to surround every Employee with [], you can modify the toString() method in Employee class:

@Override
public String toString() {
    return "[" + id + " " + firstName + " " + lastName 
        + " " + annualSalary + " " + startDate + "]";
}