Compares two strings lexicographically, ignoring case differences. This method returns an integer whose sign is that of calling compareTo with normalized versions of the strings where case differences have been eliminated by calling Character.toLowerCase(Character.toUpperCase(character)) on each character.

Note that this method does not take locale into account, and will result in an unsatisfactory ordering for certain locales. The java.text package provides collators to allow locale-sensitive ordering.

Parameters:

str

the String to be compared.

Returns:  a negative integer, zero, or a positive integer as the specified String is greater than, equal to, or less than this String, ignoring case considerations.

See also:
java.text.Collator.compare(String, String)

Since:  1.2