Command Design Pattern in Java

Java reflection and the Command design pattern

Motivation. “Sometimes it is necessary to issue requests to objects without knowing anything about the operation being requested or the receiver of the request.” The Command design pattern suggests encapsulating (“wrapping”) in an object all (or some) of the following: an object, a method name, and some arguments. Java does not support “pointers to methods”, but its reflection capability will do nicely. The “command” is a black box to the “client”. All the client does is call “execute()” on the opaque object.

import java.lang.reflect.*;

public class CommandReflect {
   private int state;
   public CommandReflect( int in ) {
      state = in;
   }
   public int addOne( Integer one ) {
      return state + one.intValue();
   }
   public int addTwo( Integer one, Integer two ) {
      return state + one.intValue() + two.intValue();
   }

   static public class Command {
      private Object   receiver;               // the "encapsulated" object
      private Method   action;                 // the "pre-registered" request
      private Object[] args;                   // the "pre-registered" arg list
      public Command( Object obj, String methodName, Object[] arguments ) {
         receiver = obj;
         args = arguments;
         Class cls = obj.getClass();           // get the object's "Class"
         Class[] argTypes = new Class[args.length];
         for (int i=0; i < args.length; i++)   // get the "Class" for each
            argTypes[i] = args[i].getClass();  //    supplied argument
         // get the "Method" data structure with the correct name and signature
         try {      action = cls.getMethod( methodName, argTypes );      }
         catch( NoSuchMethodException e ) { System.out.println( e ); }
      }
      public Object execute() {
         // in C++, you do something like --- return receiver->action( args ); 
         try {     return action.invoke( receiver, args );     }
         catch( IllegalAccessException e    ) { System.out.println( e ); }
         catch( InvocationTargetException e ) { System.out.println( e ); }
         return null;
   }  }

   public static void main( String[] args ) {
      CommandReflect[] objs = { new CommandReflect(1), new CommandReflect(2) };
      System.out.print( "Normal call results: " );
      System.out.print( objs[0].addOne( new Integer(3) ) + " " );
      System.out.print( objs[1].addTwo( new Integer(4),
                                        new Integer(5) ) + " " );
      Command[] cmds = {
         new Command( objs[0], "addOne", new Integer[] { new Integer(3) } ),
         new Command( objs[1], "addTwo", new Integer[] { new Integer(4),
                                                         new Integer(5) } ) };
      System.out.print( "\nReflection results:  " );
      for (int i=0; i < cmds.length; i++)
          System.out.print( cmds[i].execute() + " " );
      System.out.println();
}  }
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