A JustInTime class

Posted on Tue 04 April 2017 in blog

I discovered in my code a redundant pattern :

private SomeType _something;
private SomeType something { get { if (_something == null) _something = new SomeType(....); return _something;} }

Usefull in Silverlight, when your Blender always say "Can't compile ! Strange errors ! but compiles when i comment your WebClient... in ctor of that class..." So i use it to have members builded the first time they are used, "Just in time". /!\ It's not a Singleton ! i can have others instance of this class new-ing it directly ! /!\ Singleton is Evil // feed the Troll So i factorized it :

public class Jit
{
  T _instance;
  object[] _ctor_params;

  public Jit(object[] ctor_params)
    {
      _ctor_params = ctor_params;
    }

  public Jit()
    {
    }

  public T create(object[] ctor_params)
    {
      Type[] param_types = ctor_params.Aggregate>(
                 new List(),
                 (List lt, object o) =>
                           {
                 lt.Add(o.GetType());
                 return lt;
                   }).ToArray();
      var ctor = typeof(T).GetConstructor(param_types);
      if (ctor == null)
    throw new Exception(param_types.Aggregate(
              "No constructor found for " + typeof(T).Name + " taking",
                  (string i, Type t) => { return i + " " + t.Name; }));
      return (T)ctor.Invoke(_ctor_params);
    }

  public T create()
    {
      return (_ctor_params == null)
    ? create(new object[] { })
    : create(_ctor_params);
    }

  public T single()
    {
      if (_instance == null)
    _instance = create();
      return _instance;
    }
}

A usage demo:

public class Test
{
  Test(string foo, int bar)
    {
      Console.WriteLine("Test ctor with : " + foo + " and " + bar);
    }

  public void foo()
    {
      Console.WriteLine("bar");
    }
}

public partial class Page : UserControl
{
  public event EventHandler my_event;
  private Jit test = new Jit(new object[]{"42", 42});

  public Page()
    {
      InitializeComponent();
      // test is not yet built
      test.single().foo(); // Whill build a Test and call foo()
      test.single().foo(); // Whill call foo on the same Test.
    }
}

So a:

private SomeType _something;
private SomeType something { get { if (_something == null) _something = new SomeType(....); return _something;} }

become:

private Jit something = new Jit(new object[]{...});

Note the Jit ctor, taking a array of objects, it's the objects to pass to your ctor's class (found by reflection using their types).