Ulf Zibis said the following on 04/27/11 19:41:
Am 27.04.2011 11:19, schrieb David Holmes:
Ulf Zibis said the following on 04/27/11 19:09:
Am 27.04.2011 02:34, schrieb David Holmes:
Actually my comments more a response to Remi's assertion that clone
should have been used instead, without giving any technical
rationale as to why clone would be better, and so much better that
it warranted Lance changing the code.
Personally I think we should be steering people to Arrays.copyOf for
all their array copying needs.
Hm, why?
One API to learn that covers all the array-copying needs.
Ok, but from the point of *object-copying* needs, why should one care
about sophisticated array stuff?
All I'm saying is that when people think "I need a copy of this array"
then copyOf is what should come to mind. Why learn two APIs just because
one may handle a boundary case "better"?
clone() is effectively legacy code.
What does that mean?
Just that it is an old mechanism that has been around for a long time,
is limited to one specific use-case and has been made somewhat
redundant by the newer APIs.
Ok, you mean Array.copyOf() is clone() XL.
There are many places, where legacy code became redundant because of
some extensions. Should we always avoid them? E.g.:
- StringBuilder.apend(...) instead '+'
- Objects.hashcode(obj) instead obj.hashcode()
- etc...
We should prefer them if they can do an overall better job - else why
bother adding them. Why teach the old way when there is a more
advanced/useful new way? Why learn two things when you can learn one
that covers both use-cases? Sometimes there is a need for both - it
isn't an absolute.
I prefer clone():
- less to type
- better to read, especially in looong code lines, e.g. as method
call argument
True. Would be nice if defender methods were expanded to allow you to
do anArray.copyOf()
Can you explain that in other words. Sorry, I'm no english native ;-)
You argued, quite correctly, that anArray.clone() is easier to read in
some contexts, compared to Arrays.copyOf(anArray, anArray.length). I was
saying that it is a pity that the defender method mechanism (for adding
new methods to interfaces -coming in Java 8) wasn't extended so that you
could also add methods to arrays - if it were then you could write
anArray.copyOf()
Anyway I'm not interested in convincing anybody either way. What I
objected to originally was the assertion that copyOf should be replaced
by clone() with no technical justification as to why.
David
-Ulf
