Re: [again] AspectJ: solution to Java's repetitiveness? bean attributes

From:
Lew <noone@lewscanon.com>
Newsgroups:
comp.lang.java.help
Date:
Sat, 09 Aug 2008 09:24:47 -0400
Message-ID:
<-KGdnf1Zkv8CBwDVnZ2dnUVZ_tWdnZ2d@comcast.com>
Lew wrote:

thufir wrote:

It seems arcane, but there is a way to do away with the boilerplate of
getters and setters:

public class NewBean {
    public final Property<Integer> x = PropertyImpl.create();
}
Which you use like this:
NewBean b = new NewBean();
b.x.set(5);
b.x.get();

Notice that PropertyImpl.create() is equivalent to writing:
new PropertyImpl<Integer>();
It just saves us the need from typing <Integer> twice.

https://bean-properties.dev.java.net/tutorial.html

It looks ok, a bit different, but ok to me. what do you guys think?


I think it's a lot of work for no benefit.

Actually, there is some benefit to using factory classes, but
eliminating the so-called "boilerplate" because you're too lazy to
copy-and-paste it isn't part of it.

It amazes me how much effort people will expend to avoid the type safety
or thread safety ("I figured out how to avoid the 'overhead' of
synchronization!") of idioms like the repetition of type (which, BTW, is
not always the same on both sides of the assignment!), or how they'll
argue against the inclusion of Javadoc comments, but then they'll use
some even more verbose (now you need a 'PropertyImpl' class as well as a
'Property' class - now there's a reduction!) idiom or fail to take the
care with their algorithm.

This kind of exercise is a futile attempt to turn Java into a language
for lazy whiners. Not a good thing.


Wait a minute! You didn't mention AspectJ in the body of your post. Are
'Property' and 'PropertyImpl' some special AspectJ classes? If so, then your
solution sucks even worse than I thought. Now you're pulling in a whole
byte-code rewriting library to avoid "verbosity". Big win there, sport.

--
Lew

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