Brian - I follow what you are saying with composition (the decorator pattern sorta), the problem is, I don't know what these extra properties are before run time in order to create a new object to extend the base object. This is not a good example, but assume I have a user object. The end user of the application can then say in his/her case they want to track the users employeeID, so they add a new property to user called employeeID. So, the structure with get/set functions is about the only way I can see to do this, it just does not seem quite right.
Thanks for the help. -- Jeff >If you want to add/change data or behavior at runtime, you really have two >options. One is to use what you're describing, which is really based on Duck >Typing. CF is a dynamic language and as a result you can add methods to >objects at runtime. However, you're right, this does make the API more >difficult to understand because the object has no definite API, and you are >relying to client code to "know" that a given object has certain properties >or methods if you are adding or removing them dynamically at runtime. > >The other option is to use Composition. This is how most strongly-typed >languages change behavior at runtime. The API to the object remains fixed, >but you are free to swap out different objects in the composition >relationship to provide different behavior. An example might be encryption: >say you have an object that needs to perform encryption on a string, but you >want to be able to vary the actual encryption implementation. You can >compose different encryption objects into the target object, and the object >just calls encrypt() on the composed object. Depending on what encryption >object you have composed into the object, the actual encryption >implementation will change. > >Hopefully that makes sense. > >Brian > > >On Nov 12, 2007 8:55 AM, Jeff Chastain <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| ColdFusion 8 - Build next generation apps today, with easy PDF and Ajax features - download now http://download.macromedia.com/pub/labs/coldfusion/cf8_beta_whatsnew_052907.pdf Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/message.cfm/messageid:293141 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.4
