How to write a doubledispatch for the instance creation method?

Question

instance creation method, like

ClassName new

To aid with some details,

we could write a = arithmetic method in abstract class,

then doubledispatch them in subclasses.

could we use that in instance creation?

I have tried new but it fail. Leads to some predefined basic new method.

score 6 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 21 '13 at 10:34

Double Dispatch doesn't really make sense in the new case. The idea behind double dispatch, is that you can't determine the correct behavior by dispatching only to the receiver. The type of the (single) argument has an equal effect on which behavior is chosen (dispatched). In other words, double dispatch only makes sense if you have arguments to your methods, new being unary, it does not.

That said, you can certainly implement your own new method that overrides the stock default inherited one. And you can make it do all kinds of interesting things. It's common to do some sort of environment check to determine what subclass is appropriate.

AbstractClass>>>new
    ^self platform = #unix
        ifTrue: [SubclassThatLeveragesUnix basicNew]
        ifFalse: [CrappyPCSubclass basicNew]

Note that we use basicNew here, rather than new. If you used new you would need to either implement distinct overrides in those subclasses, otherwise it would just inherit and resend the AbstractClass>>>new message again.

As noted by Esteban, in Squeak/Pharo flavour it is well behaved that each new send an initialize, so it would be basicNew initialize. — aka.nice, Jun 21 '13 at 10:10

score 4 · Answer 2 · edited Jun 21 '13 at 10:35

4

... or you could do something like:

AbstractClass class>>#new 
    ^ (self platform concreteClassFor: self) basicNew initialize.

which is basically same idea, but without ifs :)

edited Jun 21 '13 at 10:35

Stephan Eggermont

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answered Jun 21 '13 at 09:45

EstebanLM

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score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Jun 29 '13 at 14:10

The key point of double dispatch is that by swapping the receiver and the argument of the primary message, you call a second time a virtual call and that you get then the effect of selecting a method based on the message receiver and its argument. Therefore you need to have message with argument.

Here is a typical example of double dispatch: addition integer and floats and performing adequate conversion.

 Integer>>+ arg
   ^ arg sumFromInteger: self

 Float>>+ arg
   ^ arg sumFromFloat: self

 Integer>>sumFromInteger: anInt  
   <primitive adding to ints>

 Integer>>sumFromFloat: aFloat
   ^ self asFloat + aFloat

 Float>>sumFromFloat: aFloat
   <primitive adding two floats>

 Float>>sumFromInteger: anInt
   ^ self + anInt asFloat

Now 1 + 1.0 will hit first + on Integer then sumFromInt: then + then sumFromFloat. Note that we have enough information so we could shortcut the second + invocation,

What the example shows is that during the first call, the dynamic message resolution finds on method (so it defining like a dynamic case) and then by swapping the argument and the receiver, the dynamic message resolution performs another case based on the arg. So at the end you get a method selected using the two objects of the original call. Now about your question: In Pharo class messages are dynamically looked up so you could implement instance creation methods using double dispatch without problem but the goal is unclear.

MyClass class>>newWith: arg
   arg newFromMyClass: aClass

How to write a doubledispatch for the instance creation method?

3 Answers3