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Message:

dynamic typecasting alternative

Posted by rabiraj on June 13, 2001 at 6:07 AM

This is an alternate solution. See if it helps you.

Class myClass = Class.forName(B);
Object obj = Factory.create("B");
Object obj1 = myClass.newInstance();
obj1 = obj;

now from obj1, u can access all the fields and the methods of class B.

> Suppose you have:

> Base class: A
> Classes derived from A: B, C, and D

> You have a factory class (Factory.create(String className) ) that will return an instance of a B, C, or D if it is passed the class name.

> Usually if you want to narrow on the object coming back, you'd do a typecast:
> B b = (B)Factory.create("B"); , but this done only at compile time.

> However, I'd like to narrow on the object at runtime instead of comile time.

> Do you know how that might be done?

> What I'd like is a way where I could specify in a string, the type of object I'm expecting back and still maintain the subclassed reference when it does get returned.

> To recap, I could create a dynamic reference variable that
> would hold the dynamically typecast'd object being returned
> from the factory method.

> Unless I'm mistaken, this appears to be the only thing missing in the Reflection API.

> Thanks,
> Mike

• Factory object Enrique December 12, 2001 at 8:08 PM (0)