Objects not the same after reading from XML

[Nick Paul Maher]

Ok so my problem is that I'm JUnit testing a method that uses an XML decoder, however the objects produced fail an assert equals test. The code is below.
Thanks in advance.

from Module class

	public static Module read(String filePath) throws IOException {
		Module result;
	    XMLDecoder decoder = new XMLDecoder(
	                              new BufferedInputStream(
	                                 new FileInputStream(filePath)));
	    result = (Module)decoder.readObject();

	    return result;
	   }

from JUnit test:

	@Test
	public void readTest() throws IOException{
		Module test = Module.read("testpath.xml");
		Module another = Module.read("testpath.xml");
		
		// fails
		assertEquals(another, test);

		// module code - passes
		assertEquals(another.getModuleCode(), test.getModuleCode());
		// assessment name - passes
		assertEquals(another.getAssessments().get(0).getName(), test.getAssessments().get(0).getName());
		// number of students - passes
		assertEquals(another.getNumberOfStudents(), test.getNumberOfStudents());
		// student forenames - passes
		assertEquals(another.getStudents().get(0).getForenames(), test.getStudents().get(0).getForenames());
	}

[Paul Clapham]

If the assertion that the two objects are "equals" fails, then the first place to look is at the equals() method of the Module class. That's what the assertion is testing, right? And yet you haven't posted that method.

[Nick Paul Maher]

Thanks Paul for pointing me in the right direction, I didn't realise you were required to write your own equals method (still learning JAVA). After overriding the equals method in all classes the assertEquals now evaluates to true.