Random Shuffling of an Array

Here is a simple way using an ArrayList:

List<Integer> solution = new ArrayList<>();
for (int i = 1; i <= 6; i++) {
    solution.add(i);
}
Collections.shuffle(solution);

Here is a working and efficient Fisher–Yates shuffle array function:

private static void shuffleArray(int[] array)
{
    int index;
    Random random = new Random();
    for (int i = array.length - 1; i > 0; i--)
    {
        index = random.nextInt(i + 1);
        if (index != i)
        {
            array[index] ^= array[i];
            array[i] ^= array[index];
            array[index] ^= array[i];
        }
    }
}

or

private static void shuffleArray(int[] array)
{
    int index, temp;
    Random random = new Random();
    for (int i = array.length - 1; i > 0; i--)
    {
        index = random.nextInt(i + 1);
        temp = array[index];
        array[index] = array[i];
        array[i] = temp;
    }
}

Collections class has an efficient method for shuffling, that can be copied, so as not to depend on it:

/**
 * Usage:
 *    int[] array = {1, 2, 3};
 *    Util.shuffle(array);
 */
public class Util {

    private static Random random;

    /**
     * Code from method java.util.Collections.shuffle();
     */
    public static void shuffle(int[] array) {
        if (random == null) random = new Random();
        int count = array.length;
        for (int i = count; i > 1; i--) {
            swap(array, i - 1, random.nextInt(i));
        }
    }

    private static void swap(int[] array, int i, int j) {
        int temp = array[i];
        array[i] = array[j];
        array[j] = temp;
    }
}

Look at the Collections class, specifically shuffle(...).

Here is a complete solution using the Collections.shuffle approach:

public static void shuffleArray(int[] array) {
  List<Integer> list = new ArrayList<>();
  for (int i : array) {
    list.add(i);
  }

  Collections.shuffle(list);

  for (int i = 0; i < list.size(); i++) {
    array[i] = list.get(i);
  }    
}

Note that it suffers due to Java's inability to smoothly translate between int[] and Integer[] (and thus int[] and List<Integer>).

You have a couple options here. A list is a bit different than an array when it comes to shuffling.

As you can see below, an array is faster than a list, and a primitive array is faster than an object array.

Sample Durations

List<Integer> Shuffle: 43133ns
    Integer[] Shuffle: 31884ns
        int[] Shuffle: 25377ns

Below, are three different implementations of a shuffle. You should only use Collections.shuffle if you are dealing with a collection. There is no need to wrap your array into a collection just to sort it. The methods below are very simple to implement.

ShuffleUtil Class

import java.lang.reflect.Array;
import java.util.*;

public class ShuffleUtil<T> {
    private static final int[] EMPTY_INT_ARRAY = new int[0];
    private static final int SHUFFLE_THRESHOLD = 5;

    private static Random rand;