Pass a class name as string argument to create instance - scala

Is there any possible way to pass a class name/path as String argument to call it in code in runtime?
Im working with some legacy code and i have no way to change it globally. Creating new integration to it suggest me to create new copy of class X, rename it, and pass new instance of Y i have created manually. My mind tells me to pass Y as some kind of argument and never copy X again.

I don't quite understand why you (think that) you need to do what you are trying to do (why copy class in the first place rather than just using it? why pass classname around instead of the class itself?), but, yeah, you can instantiate classes by (fully qualified) name using reflection.
First you get a handle to the class itself:
val clazz = Class.forName("foo.bar.X")
Then, if constructor does not need any arguments, you can just do
val instance = clazz.newInstance
If you need to pass arguments to constructor, it gets a bit more complicated.
val constructor = clazz.getConstructors().find { c =>
c.getParameters().map(_.getParameterizedType) == args.map(_.getClass)
}.getOrElse (throw new Exception("No suitable constructor found")
// or if you know for sure there will be only one constructor,
// could just do clazz.getConnstructors.headOption.getOrElse(...)
val instance = constructor.newInstance(args)
Note though, that the resulting instance is of type Object (AnyRef), so there isn't much you can actually do with it without casting to some interface type your class is known to implement.
Let me just say it again: it is very likely not the best way to achieve what you are actually trying to do. If you open another question and describe your actual problem (not the solution to it you are trying to implement), you might get more helpful answers.

Related

Using Enumeration for shared variables in Scala

Is it the right pattern to use Enumeration for holding shared variable values?
I am accepting arguments from the command line - arguments like "mongoUsername", "mongoPassword", "mongoDatabase" etc. - across a lot of different files, and want to remove the possibility of making a mistake while specifying the argument name.
I created an object as follows:
object CommonParams extends Enumeration {
val MONGO_USERNAME = "mongoUsername"
val MONGO_PASSWORD = "mongoPassword"
..
}
When accepting these parameters from the command line, the parameters will be read using CommonParams.MONGO_USERNAME rather than just "mongoUsername". This method works. My question is:
Is this the right way to do what I am trying to do?
I dont think I am using Enumeration correctly. What should I change?
What would I gain by declaring the CommonParams as follows:
.
object CommonParams extends Enumeration {
val MONGO_USERNAME = Value("mongoUsername")
val MONGO_PASSWORD = Value("mongoPassword")
..
}
If I declared CommonParams this way, I would have to use CommonParams.MONGO_USERNAME.toString each time instead of just using CommonParams.MONGO_USERNAME which is more verbose.
I understand that Enumeration can stand for a certain value being a "thing". However, I am holding a value inside an object attribute. What advantages would I get if I used the second way of declaring CommonParams?
In your first version, you should remove extends Enumeration, since you aren't actually using it.
The benefit of the second version is exactly that CommonParams.Values aren't strings, so that if you have e.g. a method accepting CommonParams.Value, you can't accidentally pass an invalid string. And also that you can get methods like CommonParams.values to list all values.

How to properly instantiate a Thrift/Scrooge generated class in Scala

I would like to instantiate a crooge generated class (or trait, better said).
Now since I can't instantiate a trait, I used a anonymous wrapper class to generate some test object I want to serealize:
val err = new ClientError{}
But I cannot set any properties to this object (or at least I don't know how).
What's the proper way to do this?
The background is I want to create an object, serialize it, send it, deserialize it and check if it worked, if the sample has the same properties.
Thanks for any help!
There is an object ClientError, with an apply method.
Just do
val err = ClientError(whatever, fields, your, thrift, struct, has)

Different field instances in class and parent/Call super constructor with method

I am trying to call the super constructor from a class using a method. The whole setup looks like this:
class Straight(hand: Hand) extends Combination(Straight.makeHandAceLowIfNeeded(hand), 5)
object Straight {
private def makeHandAceLowIfNeeded(hand: Hand): Hand = {
...
}
}
While this does compile, it has some rather odd runtime behaviour. While debugging, I noticed that the Straight instances have the "hand" property defined twice. Can somebody tell me what is going on, and what the proper way is to call the super constructor with different arguments?
In my use case, I want to call the super constructor with a modified hand in which I replaced a card compared to the original constructor argument.
Debugger screenshot with duplicate field:
.
It's a perfectly fine way to call the superclass constructor. These are two private fields and they don't conflict, though you can rename one of them to avoid confusion during debugging (or if you want to access the superclass' value from the subclass). However, the field should only be generated for a class parameter if it's used outside a constructor, and in your case it doesn't appear to be. Did you simplify the definition of Straight?

Scala v 2.10: How to get a new instance of a class (object) starting from the class name

I have tens of JSON fragments to parse, and for each one I need to get an instance of the right parser. My idea was to create a config file where to write the name of the class to instantiate for each parser (a kind of map url -> parser) . Getting back to your solution, I cannot call the method I implemented in each parser if I have a pointer to Any. I suppose this is a very common problem with a well-set solution, but I have no idea what the best practices could be.
I really have no experience with Java, Reflection, Class Loading and all that stuff. So,
can anyone write for me the body of the method below? I need to get an instance of a class passed as String (no arguments needed for the constructor, at least so far...)
def createInstance(clazzName: String) = {
// get the Class for the given clazzName, e.g. "net.my.BeautifulClazz"
// instantiate an object and return it
}
Thanks, as usual...
There is a very simple answer:
scala> def createInstance(clazzName: String) = Class.forName(clazzName).newInstance
createInstance: (clazzName: String)Any
scala> createInstance("java.lang.String")
res0: Any = ""
If it works for you, everything is fine. If it don't, we have to look into your class loader. This is usually the point when things will get dirty.
Depending in what you want to do, look into:
The cake pattern, if you want to combine your classes during compile time
OSGi when you want to build a plugin infrastructure (look here for a very simple example)
Google guice, if you really need dependency injection (e.g. when mixing Scala and Java code) and the cake pattern does not work for you

what is the input type of classOf

I am wondering what type do I put in place of XXX
def registerClass(cl:XXX) = kryo.register(classOf[cl])
EDIT: For why I want to do this.
I have to register many classes using the above code. I wanted to remove the duplication of calling kyro.register several times, hoping to write code like below:
Seq(com.mypackage.class1,com.mypackage.class2,com.mypackage.class3).foreach(registerClass)
Another question, can I pass String instead? and convert it somehow to a class in registerClass?
Seq("com.mypackage.class1","com.mypackage.class2").foreach(registerClass)
EDIT 2:
When I write com.mypackage.class1, it means any class defined in my source. So if I create a class
package com.mypackage.model
class Dummy(val ids:Seq[Int],val name:String)
I would provide com.mypackage.model.Dummy as input
So,
kryo.register(classOf[com.mypackage.model.Dummy])
Kryo is a Java Serialization library. The signature of the register class is
register(Class type)
You could do it like this:
def registerClass(cl:Class[_]) = kryo.register(cl)
And then call it like this:
registerClass(classOf[Int])
The type parameter to classOf needs to be known at compile time. Without knowing more about what you're trying to do, is there any reason you can't use:
def registerClass(cl:XXX) = kryo.register(cl.getClass)