Simon,
A possible alternative to using custom NodePointers in this situation could
be a custom Function.
Step 1. You implement a static method that does pretty much what you have in
your example:
public class MyFunc {
public static Bar barByLang(Foo foo, String ln) {
Language lang = (Language)mapping.get(ln);
return foo.getBar(lang);
}
}
Step 2. Register the MyFunc class with JXPathContext.
Step 3. Use the function like this context.getValue("barByLang(/foo,
'fr')");
Also see
http://jakarta.apache.org/commons/jxpath/users-guide.html#Extension%20Functions
Now, if you insist on custom implementation of NodePointer, choose the right
superclass. For example, BeanPropertyPointer might be the right one.
I hope this helps
- Dmitri
----- Original Message -----
From: "Simon Raess" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Jakarta Commons Users List" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, June 17, 2004 5:32 PM
Subject: [jxpath] Custom NodePointer implementation
> hi
>
> I hope to get some ideas how to implement the following:
>
> Let's say I have a class Foo that can contain several Bar instances.
> The Bar instances are accessed by a key, let's say a Language object.
> So I have the following methods in Foo:
>
> public Bar getBar(Language l);
> public Set getLanguages();
>
> In the model of my application I don't want to have an absolute
> ordering of Bar objects, that is I don't want to expose a method like
>
> public Bar getBar(int index);
>
> or similar. My idea is to have an external object impose an ordering on
> the Bar objects (that is an ordering on languages). The point is, that
> the ordering may change at runtime. What that basically means is, that
> I'll have a mapping from a int key to a Language. For example the
> mapping would contain:
>
> Language int key
> de 0
> fr 1
> en 2
>
> So my idea is to create a custom NodePointer that receives such a
> mapping definition (so it knows about the ordering of languages). The
> following xpath expression (with the above mapping definition) should
> return the text with language fr:
>
> foo/bar[2]
>
> This should be translated (by the custom NodePointer) to a call to:
>
> int index = ...;
> Foo foo = ...;
> List mapping = ...;
> Language lang = (Language)mapping.get(index);
> Bar fr_bar = foo.getBar(lang);
>
> The following xpath
>
> foo/bar
>
> should probably be converted to something like
>
> List list = foo.getBar();
>
> I'm still unconfident about the jxpath internals, so could please
> somebody give me some pointers how I could achieve that? I'm I on the
> right tracks? Which methods from NodePointer class must I override
> (except the abstract ones, of course)? Is there a simple example that
> shows how to implement a NodePointer for objects without using any
> reflection, introspection, ...? Is there anything else I should
> consider? Please ask me if I missed some important information!
>
> best regards
> Simon
>
>
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