E[] contentsArray = (E[]) contents;
      ImmutableSortedSet<E> result = construct(comparator, size, contentsArray);
      this.size = result.size(); // we eliminated duplicates in-place in contentsArray
      this.forceCopy = true;
      return result;
    }
  }

  int unsafeCompare(Object a, @CheckForNull Object b) {
    return unsafeCompare(comparator, a, b);
  }

          K[] sortedKs = (K[]) sortedKeys;
          Arrays.sort(sortedKs, comparator);
          Object[] sortedValues = new Object[size];

          // We might, somehow, be able to reorder values in-place.  But it doesn't seem like
          // there's a way around creating the separate sortedKeys array, and if we're allocating
          // one array of size n, we might as well allocate two -- to say nothing of the allocation

    period. The last release to remove non-`@Beta` APIs was Guava 21.0.) Even
    `@Deprecated` APIs will remain (again, unless they are `@Beta`). We have no
    plans to start removing things again, but officially, we're leaving our
    options open in case of surprises (like, say, a serious security problem).

3.  Guava has one dependency that is needed for linkage at runtime:

    }

    @Override
    public boolean equals(@CheckForNull Object object) {
      // Warning: this is broken if size() == 0, so it is critical that we
      // substitute an empty ImmutableSet to the user in place of this
      if (object instanceof CartesianSet) {
        CartesianSet<?> that = (CartesianSet<?>) object;
        return this.axes.equals(that.axes);
      }
      if (object instanceof Set) {

   * returned by {@code factory}. Those objects should not be manually updated and they should not
   * use soft, weak, or phantom references.
   *
   * @param map place to store the mapping from each key to its corresponding values
   * @param factory supplier of new, empty collections that will each hold all values for a given
   *     key

 * for further instructions. Whenever possible, you should change any references of type {@code
 * Ordering} to be of type {@code Comparator} instead. However, at this time we have no plan to
 * <i>deprecate</i> this class.
 *
 * <p>Many replacements involve adopting {@code Stream}, and these changes can sometimes make your

  /**
   * Returns the specified comparator if not null; otherwise returns {@code Ordering.natural()}.
   * This method is an abomination of generics; the only purpose of this method is to contain the
   * ugly type-casting in one place.
   */
  @SuppressWarnings("unchecked")
  static <E extends @Nullable Object> Comparator<? super E> orNaturalOrder(
      @CheckForNull Comparator<? super E> comparator) {