java - searching by last name in an array -

i made contact list 3 classes, contactlist class holds array stores last name, first name, street, city, state, zip, country, email, phone no., , notes.

i want implement search function last name class of contactlist, shows information of contact has last name user searched for, cant seem work. :(

import java.util.*;  public class contactlist {      //declaration of array , attributes     private final int size = 10;     private person [ ] list;     private int nextemptyelementinarray = 0;      // constructor contactlist object     public contactlist ()   {         list = new person [size];     }      // method adds new contact array     public void addnewcontact() {         list[nextemptyelementinarray] = new person();         list[nextemptyelementinarray].read();         nextemptyelementinarray++;     }      // method retrieves contacts last name      int searchbylastname(person [] list) {         scanner console;         console = new scanner(system.in);         string searchbylastname = console.next();         (int i= 0; i< list.length; i++) {             if (list[nextemptyelementinarray].lastname.equals(searchbylastname))                  return i;             }             return -1;         }     } 

your list subscript appears wrong: each iteration of loop you're doing this:

if (list[nextemptyelementinarray].lastname.equals(searchbylastname)) 

if understand question correctly, should doing this:

if (list[i].lastname.equals(searchbylastname)) 

also, careful naming variable same function. @ best it'll cause confusion.

[edit] noticed you're pre-allocating list, managing actual content length using nextemptyelementinarray. for loop should go this:

for (int i= 0; i< nextemptyelementinarray; i++)