I/m new to Kotlin. And I'm struggling with inheritance. Consider the following case.
This code is ok
open class BaseClass(
val property1: String,
val property2: String,
)
And also this
data class ExtendedClass(
val propety3: String
): BaseClass()
But here we have a compilation problem
val extended = ExtendedClass(
property1 = "",
property2 = "",
property3 = ""
)
What is the use of open class inheritance if it's prohibited to construct sub-classes in that way? Instead I have to do something like
val extended = ExtendedClass(roperty3 = "")
extended.property1 = "",
extended.property2 = ""
But that trick kills immutability.
You may want to declare the BaseClass as abstract and inherith its properties in the ExtendedClass:
abstract class BaseClass {
abstract val property1: String
abstract val property2: String
}
class ExtendedClass(
override val property1: String,
override val property2: String,
val propety3: String
) : BaseClass()
You can then initialize the ExtendedClass with the 3 immutable properties:
val extendedClass = ExtendedClass(
property1 = "Property 1",
property2 = "Property 2",
property3 = "Property 3"
)
Related
I am creating a data class in kotlin as such
data class User(val name: String, val age: Int)
{
constructor(name: String, age: Int, size: String): this(name, age) {
}
}
In my main function, I can access the objects as such:
fun main(){
val x = User("foo", 5, "M")
println(x.name)
println(x.age)
println(x.size) // does not work
}
My problem is that I can't get access to size.
What I am trying to do is, create a data class where top level params are the common items that will be accessed, and in the constructors, have additional params that fit certain situations. The purpose is so that I can do something like
// something along the lines of
if (!haveSize()){
val person = User("foo", 5, "M")
} else {
val person = User("foo", 5)
}
}
Any ideas?
In Kotlin you do not need separate constructors for defining optional constructor params. You can define them all in a single constructor with default values or make them nullable, like this:
data class User(val name: String, val age: Int, val size: String = "M")
fun main(){
val x = User("foo", 5, "L")
val y = User("foo", 5)
println(x.size) // "L" from call site
println(y.size) // "M" from default param
}
You can not access size variable, because this is from secondary construct, but we have alternative variant.
data class User(var name: String, var age: Int) {
var size: String
init {
size = "size"
}
constructor(name: String, age: Int, size: String) : this(name, age) {
this.size = size
}
}
In short, you want to have one property that can be one of a limited number of options. This could be solved using generics, or sealed inheritance.
Generics
Here I've added an interface, MountDetails, with a generic parameter, T. There's a single property, val c, which is of type T.
data class User(
val mountOptions: MountOptions,
val mountDetails: MountDetails<*>,
)
data class MountOptions(
val a: String,
val b: String
)
interface MountDetails<T : Any> {
val c: T
}
data class MountOneDetails(override val c: Int) : MountDetails<Int>
data class MountTwoDetails(override val c: String) : MountDetails<String>
Because the implementations MountDetails (MountOneDetails and MountTwoDetails) specify the type of T to be Int or String, val c can always be accessed.
fun anotherCaller(user: User) {
println(user.mountOptions.a)
println(user.mountOptions.b)
println(user.mountDetails)
}
fun main() {
val mt = MountOptions("foo", "bar")
val mountOneDetails = MountOneDetails(111)
anotherCaller(User(mt, mountOneDetails))
val mountTwoDetails = MountTwoDetails("mount two")
anotherCaller(User(mt, mountTwoDetails))
}
Output:
foo
bar
MountOneDetails(c=111)
foo
bar
MountTwoDetails(c=mount two)
Generics have downsides though. If there are lots of generic parameters it's messy, and it can be difficult at runtime to determine the type of classes thanks to type-erasure.
Sealed inheritance
Since you only have a limited number of mount details, a much neater solution is sealed classes and interfaces.
data class User(val mountOptions: MountOptions)
sealed interface MountOptions {
val a: String
val b: String
}
data class MountOneOptions(
override val a: String,
override val b: String,
val integerData: Int,
) : MountOptions
data class MountTwoOptions(
override val a: String,
override val b: String,
val stringData: String,
) : MountOptions
The benefit here is that there's fewer classes, and the typings are more specific. It's also easy to add or remove an additional mount details, and any exhaustive when statements will cause a compiler error.
fun anotherCaller(user: User) {
println(user.mountOptions.a)
println(user.mountOptions.b)
// use an exhaustive when to determine the actual type
when (user.mountOptions) {
is MountOneOptions -> println(user.mountOptions.integerData)
is MountTwoOptions -> println(user.mountOptions.stringData)
// no need for an 'else' branch
}
}
fun main() {
val mountOne = MountOneOptions("foo", "bar", 111)
anotherCaller(User(mountOne))
val mountTwo = MountTwoOptions("foo", "bar", "mount two")
anotherCaller(User(mountTwo))
}
Output:
foo
bar
111
foo
bar
mount two
This is really the "default values" answer provided by Hubert Grzeskowiak adjusted to your example:
data class OneDetails(val c: Int)
data class TwoDetails(val c: String)
data class MountOptions(val a: String, val b: String)
data class User(
val mountOptions: MountOptions,
val detailsOne: OneDetails? = null,
val detailsTwo: TwoDetails? = null
)
fun main() {
fun anotherCaller(user: User) = println(user)
val mt = MountOptions("foo", "bar")
val one = OneDetails(1)
val two = TwoDetails("2")
val switch = "0"
when (switch) {
"0" -> anotherCaller(User(mt))
"1" -> anotherCaller(User(mt, detailsOne = one))
"2" -> anotherCaller(User(mt, detailsTwo = two))
"12" -> anotherCaller(User(mt, detailsOne = one, detailsTwo = two))
else -> throw IllegalArgumentException(switch)
}
}
My use case:
I have a large number of POJO models that are different types of requests for a third-party API. All of them have several common fields and a couple unique ones.
I was hoping to build something that conceptually looks like this
class RequestBase(
val commonField1: String,
val commonField2: String,
...
val commonFieldX: String
)
class RequestA(
val uniqueFieldA: String
): RequestBase()
class RequestB(
val uniqueFieldB: String
): RequestBase()
fun main() {
val requestA = RequestA(
commonField1 = "1",
commonField2 = "2",
...
uniqueFieldA = "A"
)
}
I can of course override the common fields in every child request and then pass them to the parent constructor, but this ends up producing a lot of boilerplate code and bloats the model. Are there any options I can explore here?
Notice that what you are doing in the parentheses that follow a class declaration is not "declaring what properties this class has", but "declaring the parameters of this class' primary constructor". The former is just something you can do "along the way", by adding var or val.
Each class can have its own primary constructor that take any number and types of parameters that it likes, regardless of what class its superclass is. Therefore, it is not unreasonable to have to specify all the parameters of the constructor:
open class RequestBase(
val commonField1: String,
val commonField2: String,
...
val commonFieldX: String
)
class RequestA(
// notice that the parameters for the inherited properties don't have the
// "val" prefix, because you are not declaring them in the subclass again.
// These are just constructor parameters.
commonField1: String,
commonField2: String,
...
commonFieldX: String,
val uniqueFieldA: String,
): RequestBase(
commonField1,
commonField2,
...
commonFieldX,
)
If you find this unpleasant, there are a bunch of ways to work around this.
One way is to use composition and delegation - create an interface having the common properties. The specific requests' primary constructors will take a RequestBase and their unique properties, and implement the interface by delegating to the RequestBase:
interface Request {
val commonField1: String
val commonField2: String
val commonFieldX: String
}
open class RequestBase(
override val commonField1: String,
override val commonField2: String,
override val commonFieldX: String
): Request
class RequestA(
val requestBase: RequestBase,
val uniqueField: String
): Request by requestBase
This allows you to access someRequestA.commonFieldX directly, without doing someRequestA.requestBase.commonFieldX, but to create a RequestA, you need to create a RequestBase first:
RequestA(
RequestBase(...),
uniqueField = ...
)
Another way is to change your properties to vars, give them default values, and move them out of the constructor parameters:
open class RequestBase {
var commonField1: String = ""
var commonField2: String = ""
var commonFieldX: String = ""
}
class RequestA: RequestBase() {
var uniqueField: String = ""
}
Then to create an instance of RequestA, you would just call its parameterless constructor, and do an apply { ... } block:
RequestA().apply {
commonField1 = "foo"
commonField2 = "bar"
commonFieldX = "baz"
uniqueField = "boo"
}
The downside of this is of course that the properties are all mutable, and you have to think of a default value for every property. You might have to change some properties to nullable because of this, which might not be desirable.
You can't do it with constructors of base class. Without constructors it's possible:
open class RequestBase {
lateinit var commonField1: String
lateinit var commonField2: String
...
lateinit var commonFieldX: String
}
class RequestA(
val uniqueFieldA: String
): RequestBase()
class RequestB(
val uniqueFieldB: String
): RequestBase()
fun main() {
val requestA = RequestA(
uniqueFieldA = "A"
).apply {
commonField1 = "1"
commonField2 = "2"
...
commonFieldX = "X"
}
}
For interface:
interface Some {
val p1: String get() = "p1"
val p2: String get() = "p2"
}
For class:
class SomeImpl(
override val p1: String = super.p1
override val p2: String = super.p2
) : Some
Its wrong, a compile error occurs. I tried such as:
super.Some.p1, Some.super.p1, super#Some.p1, this#Some.p1, none correct...
super is not defined in the context of setting default value for constructor parameter. It's defined only inside the class body. So you may use the following workarounds:
VARIANT 1
Use auxilary nullable constructor parameters:
class SomeImpl(_p1: String? = null, _p2: String? = null) : Some {
override val p1: String = _p1 ?: super.p1
override val p2: String = _p2 ?: super.p2
}
Usage:
val someImpl0 = SomeImpl()
println("${someImpl0.p1}, ${someImpl0.p2}") //p1, p2
val someImpl1 = SomeImpl("1")
println("${someImpl1.p1}, ${someImpl1.p2}") //1, p2
val someImpl2 = SomeImpl("1", "2")
println("${someImpl2.p1}, ${someImpl2.p2}") //1, 2
VARIANT 2
You may move p1 & p2 interface parameters to companion object, so derived classes may use them as default values in constructor while hiding them:
interface Some {
companion object {
const val p1 = "p1"
const val p2 = "p2"
}
}
class SomeImpl(val p1: String = Some.p1, val p2: String = Some.p2) : Some
Usage is the same. BUT in this case (unlike in the first variant) properties will be unaccesible from instance if it will be casted to Some:
val someImpl : Some = SomeImpl()
println("${someImpl.p1}, ${someImpl.p2}") //Will not compile
I'm got a situation where I have a common property that must be defined on each of the subclasses of a sealed class.
I'd like the ability to be able to access the set/list of these values without 'duplicating' the list (by hard coding it)
Hopefully the below code conveys what I mean
sealed class S {
companion object {
// want to avoid typing: listOf("these", "values", please")
// instead grab it from the classes themselves
val properties = S::class.sealedSubclasses.map { /* What to do here? */ }
}
abstract val property: String
}
class A(val d: String) : S() {
override val property: String = "these"
}
class B(val e: String) : S() {
override val property: String = "values"
}
class C(val f: String) : S() {
override val property: String = "please"
}
I'm aware of fun <T : Any> KClass<T>.createInstance(): T from kotlin.reflect.full, but my constructors have non optional parameters.
You can create a createInstance(vararg) extension function for that:
fun <T : Any> KClass<T>.createInstance(vararg args: Any): T =
java.constructors.first().newInstance(*args) as T
S::class.sealedSubclasses.map { it.createInstance("the string") }
I have the following abstract class:
abstract class AbstractBook {
abstract val type: String
abstract val privateData: Any
abstract val publicData: Any
}
and the following class which inherits the AbstactBook class:
data class FantasyBook (
override val type: String = "FANTASY",
override val privateData: FantasyBookPrivateData,
override val publicData: FantasyBookPublicData
) : AbstractBook()
And then there is this class which should include data from any type of AbstractBook:
data class BookState(
val owner: String,
val bookData: AbstractBook,
val status: String
)
If I have an instance of BookState, how do I check which type of Book it is and then access the according FantasyBookPrivateData, and FantasyBookPublicData variables?
I hope I described my issue well & thanks in advance for any help!
What you describe is a sealed class:
sealed class Book<T, K> {
abstract val type: String
abstract val privateData: T
abstract val publicData: K
data class FantasyBook(
override val type: String = "FANTASY",
override val privateData: String,
override val publicData: Int) : Book<String, Int>()
}
and in your data class you can do pattern matching like this:
data class BookState(
val owner: String,
val bookData: Book<out Any, out Any>,
val status: String) {
init {
when(bookData) {
is Book.FantasyBook -> {
val privateData: String = bookData.privateData
}
}
}
}
to access your data in a type-safe manner. This solution also makes type redundant since you have that information in the class itself.
I agree with #Marko Topolnik that this seems like a code smell, so you might want to rethink your design.
interface AbstractBook<T , U> {
val privateData: T
val publicData: U
}
data class FantasyBook (
override val privateData: FantasyBookPrivateData,
override val publicData: FantasyBookPublicData
) : AbstractBook<FantasyBookPrivateData , FantasyBookPublicData>
data class BookState(
val owner: String,
val bookData: AbstractBook<*, *>,
val status: String
)
if(bookState.bookData is FantasyBook) {
// Do stuff
}
Creating a type variable is a weak type language writing style. You should use generic class.