forName("setMethod")

[adm1122]

Is is possible to create a known class and then use a string
as the method name? similar to this sample. I want to use this where the method to be invoked will be read in as a string from an input file.

AnyClass c = new AnyClass();
c.("setMethod&quot

thanks.

 

[stephendfrancis]

If "yourClass" is a Class object represent your class, "yourInst" is an instance of your class, and strMethod is a string containing the name of the method to be invoked, then there are 2 approaches, depending on whether all the methods have unique names or whether at least two have the same names and different signatures.

import java.lang.reflect;

1. All method names unique

Method[] yourMethods = yourClass.getDeclaredMethods();
for ( int i = 0; i < yourMethods.length; i++ ) {
if ( strMethod.equals( yourMethods[ i ].toString() ) ) {
yourInst.invoke( yourMethods[ i ], args );
//etc
}
}

2. Some method names not unique

Method yourMethod = yourClass.getDeclaredMethod( strMethod, parameterTypes );
yourInst.invoke( yourMethod, args );

where args is an array of Objects containing the arguments
and parameterTypes is an array of Classes representing the method's signature

more info can be found in the J2SE API documentation for java.lang Class and java.lang.reflect Method

 

[adm1122]

Thanks. I'll give it a try in the morning