Should the framework try to convert transitively?
Gary
On Aug 15, 2013, at 6:56, James Carman <ja...@carmanconsulting.com> wrote:
> I personally think we're over-thinking this thing. Keep it simple, folks:
>
> public interface Converter<F,T>
> {
> T convert(F from);
> }
>
> You can auto-detect the F/T parameters when a Converter is registered.
>
> On Thu, Aug 15, 2013 at 4:42 AM, Jörg Schaible
> <joerg.schai...@scalaris.com> wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> Emmanuel Bourg wrote:
>>
>>> Le 14/08/2013 17:39, Adrian Crum a écrit :
>>>
>>>> Instead of
>>>>
>>>> int columnInt = record.getValueAsInt(1);
>>>>
>>>> the developer would use
>>>>
>>>> Integer columnInt = Util.convertTo(record.getValue(1), Integer.class);
>>>
>>> +1 for the static method, that would allow the use of a static import
>>> and a very concise syntax like:
>>>
>>> Integer columnInt = to(Integer.class, record.getValue(1));
>>>
>>>
>>> That being said, [convert] could offer several patterns to perform type
>>> conversion, and the use of proxies could be one of them.
>>
>> I never had a look at [convert], but this proposed syntax reminds me
>> strongly to an own little framework, where I have following methods in an
>> interface to convert strings into arbitrary objects:
>>
>> ================= %< ==============
>> <T> T get(Class<T> type, String key);
>> <T> T get(ValueConverter<T> converter, String key);
>> ================= %< ==============
>>
>> The value converter itself is very primitive:
>>
>> ================= %< ==============
>> public interface ValueConverter<T>
>> {
>> T get(CharSequence value);
>> }
>> ================= %< ==============
>>
>> The question is now, how to know about existing converters. I was inspired
>> by XStream and use a class ConverterLookup that has following method:
>>
>> ================= %< ==============
>> public <T> ValueConverter<T> lookup(final Class<T> type)
>> {
>> ValueConverter<?> converter = converterCache.get(type);
>> if (converter == null) {
>> for (final Iterator<ConverterFactory> iter = converters.iterator();
>> converter == null && iter.hasNext();) {
>> converter = iter.next().willConvert(type);
>> }
>>
>> synchronized (converterCache) {
>> if (converter != null) {
>> converterCache.putIfAbsent(type, converter);
>> }
>> }
>> }
>>
>> @SuppressWarnings("unchecked")
>> final ValueConverter<T> checkedConverter = (ValueConverter<T>) converter;
>> return checkedConverter;
>> }
>> ================= %< ==============
>>
>> I.e. the ConverterLookup has a (priorized) set of ConverterFactory
>> implementations that can be requested for a ValueConverter of the given
>> type.
>>
>> The ConverterLookup has additionally one static method "getDefaultLookup()"
>> that returns an instance of the ConverterLookup where the set of
>> ConverterFactory implementations is detected and instantiated using the Java
>> SPI mechanism. That makes it very convenient to add new ConverterFactory
>> implementations even to the default ConverterLookup. Therefore the
>> implementation of the two get methods is quite simple:
>>
>> ================= %< ==============
>> @Override
>> public <T> T get(final Class<T> type, final String key)
>> {
>> final ValueConverter<T> converter =
>> ConverterFactory.getDefaultLookup().lookup(type);
>> return get(converter, key);
>> }
>>
>> @Override
>> public <T> T get(final ValueConverter<T> converter, final String key)
>> {
>> final String value = retrieveString(key); // get String to convert
>> return converter.get(value);
>> }
>> ================= %< ==============
>>
>> You may ask, why there is an additional ConverterFactory to create the
>> ValueConverter instances? Actually it can be useful for a converter to
>> implement both interfaces:
>>
>> ================= %< ==============
>> public abstract class AbstractFactoryConverter<T> implements
>> ValueConverter<T>, ConverterFactory
>> {
>> private final Class<? super T> type;
>> protected AbstractFactoryConverter(final Class<? super T> type)
>> {
>> this.type = type;
>> }
>>
>> @Override
>> public int getPriority()
>> {
>> return getClass().getAnnotation(Priority.class).value();
>> }
>>
>> @Override
>> public ValueConverter<?> willConvert(final Class<?> type)
>> {
>> return this.type == type ? this : null;
>> }
>> }
>>
>> @Priority
>> public class StringConverter extends AbstractFactoryConverter<String>
>> {
>> public StringConverter()
>> {
>> super(String.class);
>> }
>>
>> @Override
>> public String get(final CharSequence value)
>> {
>> return value == null ? null : value.toString();
>> }
>> }
>> ================= %< ==============
>>
>> However, to handle types in a generic way, the factory provides a much
>> better possibility. See the implementation of my EnumConverterFactory:
>>
>> ================= %< ==============
>> public class EnumConverterFactory implements ConverterFactory
>> {
>> @Override
>> public ValueConverter<?> willConvert(final Class<?> type)
>> {
>> if (Enum.class.isAssignableFrom(type)) {
>> return new ValueConverter<Enum<?>>() {
>> @Override
>> @SuppressWarnings({"rawtypes", "unchecked"})
>> public Enum<?> get(final CharSequence value)
>> {
>> return Enum.valueOf((Class<Enum>) type, value.toString());
>> }
>> };
>> }
>> return null;
>> }
>>
>> @Override
>> public int getPriority()
>> {
>> return Priority.LOW;
>> }
>> }
>> ================= %< ==============
>>
>> Apart from those factories, I have one for all the primitive types, one for
>> arrays and one based on reflection that uses a given type's constructor
>> taking a single String. That allows me to write following code for an
>> instance 'store' that owns the two get methods above:
>>
>> ================= %< ==============
>> int i = store.get(int.class, "42");
>> Long l = store.get(Long.class, "42");
>> URL url = store.get(URL.class, "http://www.apache.org/";);
>> Priority p = store.get(Priority.class, "LOW"); // an enum
>> Priority[] pArray = store.get(Priority[].class, "LOW,HIGH");
>>
>> ValueConverter<URL[].class> converter =
>> new ArrayConverterFactory('|').willConvert(URL[].class);
>> URL[] urlArray = store.get(converter,
>> "http://www.apache.org/|http://commons.apache.org/";);
>> ================= %< ==============
>>
>> The code above is a bit simplified (stripped exception handling), but
>> the complete stuff contains just 2 interfaces, 1 annotation, one exception
>> and 7 classes with not too much code. I always intended to add this to
>> [lang] in a package 'converter', when I learned that we have a [convert]
>> component. Now I am not sure what to do with it ...
>>
>> - Jörg
>>
>>
>>
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