Simplify several boolean conditions java

Question

how would you simplify all these conditions?

String s = "The wold is big"

if(s.contains("is") || s.contains("are") || s.contains("was") || s.contains("were")) 
{ 
    return s;
}

Since I have to check several cases like those, is there a way to simplify all those conditions?

Answer 1

I would write a utility method for that:

public static boolean containsAny(String s, String... words) {
    for (String word : words) {
        if (s.contains(word))
            return true;
    }
    return false;
}

And now:

if (containsAny(s, "is", "are", "was", "were")) {...}

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Java 8 alternative:

if (Arrays.asList("is", "are", "was", "were").stream().anyMatch(s::contains)) {...}