CODEWITHSUNDEEP
scala
Guille
Guille

Reputation: 2320

Difference between Any and generic type

I have seen this function. I created this function with generic types but I saw this solution. I don't know if type the args with Any is better or there's different.

def flatten(ls: List[Any]): List[Any] = ls flatMap {
    case ms: List[_] => flatten(ms)
    case e => List(e)
  }

or

def flatten(ls: List[A]): List[A]

Upvotes: 1

Views: 693

Answers (1)

Kao
Kao

Reputation: 2272

One of the differences is, when you take Any, you lose all type information, however with generics, you still have a notion of the type.

For example, if you have a function of (Any) => Any, you can take any type and return any type.

With generic you could however restrict that if you take an instance of T you must also return an instance of T, as (T) => T.

Using generics will enable the compiler to help you check that you infact does return a List[T].

Upvotes: 7

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