In the previous section, we learned about how to aid our programs and making decisions using control statements. We learned the three categories of control statements: sequential or sequence, selection, and repetition. This knowledge has now enabled us to dive deeper into more areas of interest. The topic of this section is the fundamentals of data structures, that is containers that hold other data. Specifically, we learn about the regular built-in arrays that Java provides as part of the language, as well as the ArrayList class, which lives in the java.util package just like scanner and other things do.

With these fundamental data structures under our belt, we'll be able to store more than one piece of data at a time using a single variable identifier. This section will open up more opportunities to explore more complex data structures and concepts later on which can really enhance your problem-solving abilities. We'll round out the section with three projects, one with a raise, one with ArrayLists, and one on the really interesting topic of Parallel Arrays or Parallel ArrayLists. Knowing how to work with data structures is key information that will enable you to succeed in industry and build large-scale solutions to problems that would be impossible without them. I hope you have your thinking caps on your head because we have a lot of cool information to absorb and skills to learn in this section. Without further ado, let's get going.