How do I utilize an array of a specific class? - arrays

Question

I am trying to input a file that contains the first and last names of several individuals from a file into a java program. I have a People class that has two Strings for the first and last names, as well as, accessors and mutators to access the information. Inside my main method, I have a while loop that brings in each person line by line until the end of the file. It is suppose to create a new instance of Person through the constructor for each line and make a copy to the array. When I print out the contents of the array once the while loop is over with, it seems that the array is filled with the information of the last person in the file. However, if I comment out the String[] values = line.split("\t"); and Person child = new Person(values[0], values[1]); lines and use a double dimensional array to hold a copy of all the information in the file, then it works fine. Is there something that I am doing wrong that is preventing me from retaining a copy of all the individual’s names contained in the file in the People array?
public class Person
{
protected static String first;
protected static String last;
private static int id;
public Person(String l, String f)
{
last = l;
first = f;
} // end of constructor
public String getFirst()
{
return first;
} // end of getFirst method
public static String getLast()
{
return last;
} // end of getLast method
public static int getID()
{
return id;
} // end of getLast method
public static void setFirst(String name)
{
first = name;
} // end of setFirst method
public static void setLast(String name)
{
last = name;
} // end of setLast method
public static void setID(int num)
{
id = num;
} // end of setLast method
} // end of Person class
public class Driver
{
public static void main(String arg[])
{
Person[] temp = new Person[10];
try
{
BufferedReader br = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(arg[1]));
String line = null;
int counter = 0;
while ((line = br.readLine()) != null)
{
String[] values = line.split("\t");
Person child = new Person(values[0], values[1]);
temp[counter] = child;
System.out.println("Index " + counter + ": Last: " + child.getLast() + " First: " + child.getFirst());
System.out.println("Index " + counter + ": Last: " + temp[counter].getLast() + " First: " + temp[counter].getFirst() + "\n");
counter++;
}
br.close();
}
catch(Exception e)
{
System.out.println("Could not find file");
}
for(int row = 0; row < 7; row++)
{
System.out.print("Row: " + row + " Last: " + temp[row].getLast() + " First: " + temp[row].getFirst() + "\n");
}
}
} // end of Driver class

Answer 1

The fields in class Person should not be static, a static field means shares the value for all instances of the class, that means all the 10 instances Person have the same "first", "last" and "id" values. And you need to change the methods of Person to non-static too, since static method cannot access static fields.