How to use friend class in C++/CX? - windows-runtime

I need to access class A 's private member in class B 's function and I want to use friend class. however, it seems can not be used as the c++ way .
"error C3816" class Class2 was previously declared or defined with a different WinRT modifier
How can I do to solve it?
P.S.: I can not write get/set function in public area, for I do not want class user to know private member .

Keep in mind why you'd declare a C++/CX ref class, it is to allow a program written in another language to use your C++ code. Such a language will not have any notion of the friend keyword, it is highly specific to the C++ language. Only a C++ compiler is capable of enforcing the friend contract. And in fact will not work at all when, say, that client code is written in C#, the CLR strongly enforces accessibility. Accordingly, the metadata format of the .winmd file that's generated by your project doesn't support expressing the notion of friend at all. So the compiler doesn't either.
First check to make sure you are using C++/CX appropriately, only use the ref class keyword if you actually intended to make the class accessible to other languages. Use a regular C++ class, plain class without the ref contextual keyword, if the class is only going to be used by your own code. If it is truly intended to be used as an interop class then you will have no other option but to make the member public.

Access specifiers are precautionary to prevent accidental access and so std C++ & stl performance with specific select CX friends- for say holding xaml binding datacontext containers- is straightforward approach. For whichever reason, VC++ is racist w. r. t. WinRT ABI mingling through OOP. One known alternative is to switch to generative meta programming instead of OO. To do this, keep template member function in the class that wants to befriend the consumer, and specialize this in the scope of the consumer and then onwards use the specialized version from within the consumer. Its sort of hidden from Microsoft family friendship affair.

You can solve this by using
friend ref class Class2;
instead of
friend class Class2

Related

How do you describe new to a new CS student?

In OOP, there are entities (e.g. Person) which has attributes (e.g. name, address, etc) and it has methods. How do you describe new? Is it a method or just special token to bring an abstract entity to real one?
Sometimes it's a method, sometimes it's just syntactic sugar that invokes an allocator method. The language matters.
To your CS student? Don't sugar-coat it, they need to be able to get their heads around the concepts pretty quickly and using metaphors unrelated to the computer field, while fine for trying to explain it to your 80-year-old grandmother, will not help out a CS student much.
Simply put, tell them that a class is a specification for something and that an object is a concrete instance of that something. All new does is create a concrete instance based on the specification. This includes both creation (not necessarily class-specific, which is why I'd hesitate to call it a method, reserving that term for class-bound functions) and initialisation (which is class-specific).
Depending on the language new is a keyword which can be used as an operator or as a modifier. For instance in C# new can be used:
new operator - used to create objects on the heap and invoke constructors.
new modifier - used to hide an inherited member from a base class member
For brand new students I would describe new only as a keyword and leave the modifier out of the discussion. I describe classes as blueprints and new as the mechanism by which those blueprints turn into something tangible - objects.
You may want to checkout my question: How to teach object oriented programming to procedural programmers for other great answers on teaching OOP to new developers.
In most object-oriented languages, new is simply a convention for naming a factory method. But it's only one of many conventions.
In Ruby, for example, it is conventional to name the factory method [] for collection classes. In Python, classes are simply their own factories. In Io, the factory method is generally called clone, in Ioke and Seph it is called mimic.
In Smalltalk, factory methods often have more descriptive names than just new:. Something like fromList: or with:.
Here's a simile that has worked for me in the past.
An object definition is a Jello Mold. "new" is the process that actually makes a Jello snack from that mold. Each Goopy Jello thing that you give to your new neighbors can be different, this one's green, this one has bits of fruit in it, etc. It's its own unique "object." But the mold is the same.
Or you can use a factory analogy or something, (or blueprints vs building).
As far as its role in the syntax, it's just a keyword that lets the compiler know the allocate memory on the heap and run the constructor. There's not much more to it.
Smalltalk: it's an instance method on the metaclass. So "new is a method that returns a newly-allocated instance."
I tell people that a class is like a plan on how to make an object. An object is made from the class by new. If they need more than that, well, I just don't know what to say. ;-)
new is a keyword that calls the class constructor of the class to the right of it with the arguments listed inside ().
String str = new String("asdf");
str is defined as being a String class variable using the constructor and argument "asdf"
At least that's how it was presented to me.
In Ruby, I believe it's a instance method on the metaclass. In CLOS it's a generic function called make-instance but otherwise roughly the same.
In some languages, like Java, new has special syntax, and the metaclass part is hidden. In the case where you have to teach somebody OO with such a language, I don't know that there's much you can do. (Taking a break from teaching OO and Java to teach a second object system would almost certainly just confuse them further!) Just explain what it does, and that it's a special case.
You can say that a class is a prototype/blueprint for an object. When you give it the keyword new, that prototype/blueprint comes to life. It's like you're giving a breath of life to those dead instance.
In Java,
new allocates memory for a new class instance (object)
new runs a class's constructor to initialize that instance
new returns a reference to that new instance
As far as the relationship between object/instance and class, I sometimes think:
class is to instance as blueprint is to building
new in most languages does some variation of the following:
designate some memory region for a class instance, and if neccesary, inform the garbage collector about how to free that memory later.
initialize that memory region in the manner specific to that class, transforming the bytes of raw memory into bytes of a valid instance of the class
return a reference to the memory location to the caller.

Naming of classes providing the complete implementation of an interface, but which are designed to be extended / used as mixins

If you write an interface with a lot of methods, say IPerson, and you expect a lot of different implementations of it, it is quite common practice to provide an abstract class AbstractPerson which implements the bulk of the functionality.
Normally AbstractPerson is abstract, since you usually leave some key functionality unimplemented. In this case the naming makes sense.
But what is a good naming convention in case you already implemented all of IPerson, but still expect subclasses? Perhaps PersonMixin, PersonHelper, GenericPerson or simply Person? I think Person is a bit vague, since it doesn't clearly show the intended usage.
Although this is from the Framework Design Guidelines (for .NET), I think it applies equally to any language. The reccomendation is:
Avoid naming bases class with the Base suffix if the class is intended to be used in public APIs. If the library exposes the base class as a return type or parameter type, it should not have the Base suffix.
In general, if the class is public (or even private, although there is less risk in that case) and you name it PersonBase there is an implication that it is a base class. If at some point in the future the class hierarchy is refactored and PersonBase is no longer the base class you would want to rename PersonBase to something else which would most likely result in a breaking change for any consumer code.
I would simply name the class Person and let any derived classes use more specific names. I think Person is very clear and indicative of it's use as a generic (non-specific) person.
I think Person is just fine. The whole point is that you might specialize it to specific types of people, but it's still a person.
If it can be used as-is, I'd stick with Person. If not, I'd make it abstract (even if it has no abstract members) and call it PersonBase.

What are namespaces for ? what about usages?

what is the purpose of namespaces ?
and, more important, should they be used as objects in java (things that have data and functions and that try to achieve encapsulation) ? is this idea to far fetched ? :)
or should they be used as packages in java ?
or should they be used more generally as a module system or something ?
Given that you use the Clojure tag, I suppose that you'll be interested in a Clojure-specific answer:
what is the purpose of namespaces ?
Clojure namespaces, Java packages, Haskell / Python / whatever modules... At a very high level, they're all different names for the same basic mechanism whose primary purpose is to prevent name clashes in non-trivial codebases. Of course, each solution has its own little twists and quirks which make sense in the context of a given language and would not make sense outside of it. The rest of this answer will deal with the twists and quirks specific to Clojure.
A Clojure namespace groups Vars, which are containers holding functions (most often), macro functions (functions used by the compiler to generate macroexpansions of appropriate forms, normally defined with defmacro; actually they are just regular Clojure functions, although there is some magic to the way in which they are registered with the compiler) and occasionally various "global parameters" (say, clojure.core/*in* for standard input), Atoms / Refs etc. The protocol facility introduced in Clojure 1.2 has the nice property that protocols are backed by Vars, as are the individual protocol functions; this is key to the way in which protocols present a solution to the expression problem (which is however probably out of the scope of this answer!).
It stands to reason that namespaces should group Vars which are somehow related. In general, creating a namespace is a quick & cheap operation, so it is perfectly fine (and indeed usual) to use a single namespace in early stages of development, then as independent chunks of functionality emerge, factor those out into their own namespaces, rinse & repeat... Only the things which are part of the public API need to be distributed between namespaces up front (or rather: prior to a stable release), since the fact that function such-and-such resides in namespace so-and-so is of course a part of the API.
and, more important, should they be used as objects in java (things that have data and functions and that try to achieve encapsulation) ? is this idea to far fetched ? :)
Normally, the answer is no. You might get a picture not too far from the truth if you approach them as classes with lots of static methods, no instance methods, no public constructors and often no state (though occasionally there may be some "class data members" in the form of Vars holding Atoms / Refs); but arguably it may be more useful not to try to apply Java-ish metaphors to Clojure idioms and to approach a namespace as a group of functions etc. and not "a class holding a group of functions" or some such thing.
There is an important exception to this general rule: namespaces which include :gen-class in their ns form. These are meant precisely to implement a Java class which may later be instantiated, which might have instance methods and per-instance state etc. Note that :gen-class is an interop feature -- pure Clojure code should generally avoid it.
or should they be used as packages in java ?
They serve some of the same purposes packages were designed to serve (as already mentioned above); the analogy, although it's certainly there, is not that useful, however, just because the things which packages group together (Java classes) are not at all like the things which Clojure namespaces group together (Clojure Vars), the various "access levels" (private / package / public in Java, {:private true} or not in Clojure) work very differently etc.
That being said, one has to remember that there is a certain correspondence between namespaces and packages / classes residing in particular packages. A namespace called foo.bar, when compiled, produces a class called bar in the package foo; this means, in particular, that namespace names should contain at least one dot, as so-called single-segment names apparently lead to classes being put in the "default package", leading to all sorts of weirdness. (E.g. I find it impossible to have VisualVM's profiler notice any functions defined in single-segment namespaces.)
Also, deftype / defrecord-created types do not reside in namespaces. A (defrecord Foo [...] ...) form in the file where namespace foo.bar is defined creates a class called Foo in the package foo.bar. To use the type Foo from another namespace, one would have to :import the class Foo from the foo.bar package -- :use / :require would not work, since they pull in Vars from namespaces, which records / types are not.
So, in this particular case, there is a certain correspondence between namespaces and packages which Clojure programmers who wish to take advantage of some of the newer language features need to be aware of. Some find that this gives an "interop flavour" to features which are not otherwise considered to belong in the realm of interop (defrecord / deftype / defprotocol are a good abstraction mechanism even if we forget about their role in achieving platform speed on the JVM) and it is certainly possible that in some future version of Clojure this flavour might be done away with, so that the namespace name / package name correspondence for deftype & Co. can be treated as an implementation detail.
or should they be used more generally as a module system or something ?
They are a module system and this is indeed how they should be used.
A package in Java has its own namespace, which provides a logical grouping of classes. It also helps prevent naming collisions. For example in java you will find java.util.Date and java.sql.Date - two different classes with the same name differentiated by their namespace. If you try an import both into a java file, you will see that it wont compile. At least one version will need to use its explicit namespace.
From a language independant view, namespaces are a way to isolate things (i.e. encapsulate in a sens). It's a more general concept (see xml namespaces for example). You can "create" namespaces in several ways, depending on the language you use: packages, static classes, modules and so on. All of these provides namespaces to the objects/data/functions they contain. This allow to organize the code better, to isolate features, tends for better code reuse and adaptability (as encapsulation)
As stated in the "Zen of Python", "Namespaces are one honking great idea -- let's do more of those !".
Think of them as containers for your classes. As in if you had a helper class for building strings and you wanted it in your business layer you would use a namespace such as MyApp.Business.Helpers. This allows your classes to be contained in sensical locations so when you or some else referencing your code wants to cosume them they can be located easily. For another example if you wanted to consume a SQL connection helper class you would probably use something like:
MyApp.Data.SqlConnectionHelper sqlHelper = new MyApp.Data.SqlConnectionHelper();
In reality you would use a "using" statement so you wouldn't need to fully qualify the namespace just to declare the variable.
Paul

Can I change class types in a setter with an object-oriented language?

Here is the problem statement: Calling a setter on the object should result in the object to change to an object of a different class, which language can support this?
Ex. I have a class called "Man" (Parent Class), and two children namely "Toddler" and "Old Man", they are its children because they override a behaviour in Man called as walk. ( i.e Toddler sometimes walks using both his hands and legs kneeled down and the Old man uses a stick to support himself).
The Man class has a attribute called age, I have a setter on Man, say setAge(int ageValue). I have 3 objects, 2 toddlers, 1 old-Man. (The system is up and running, I guess when we say objects it is obvious). I will make this call, toddler.setAge(80), I expect the toddler to change to an object of type Old Man. Is this possible? Please suggest.
Thanks,
This sounds to me like the model is wrong. What you have is a Person whose relative temporal grouping and some specific behavior changes with age.
Perhaps you need a method named getAgeGroup() which returns an appropriate Enum, depending on what the current age is. You also need an internal state object which encapsulates the state-specific behavior to which your Person delegates behavior which changes with age.
That said, changing the type of an instantiated object dynamically will likely only be doable only with dynamically typed languages; certainly it's not doable in Java, and probably not doable in C# and most other statically typed languages.
This is a common problem that you can solve using combination of OO modelling and design patterns.
You will model the class the way you have where Toddler and OldMan inherit from Man base class. You will need to introduce a Proxy (see GoF design pattern) class as your access to your Man class. Internally, proxy hold a man object/pointer/reference to either Toddler or OldMan. The proxy will expose all the interfaces that is exposed by Man class so that you can use it as it is and in your scenario, you will implement setAge similar to the pseudo code below:
public void setAge(int age)
{
if( age > TODDLER_MAX && myMan is Toddler)
myMan = new OldMan();
else
.....
myMan.setAge(age);
}
If your language does not support changing the classtype at runtime, take a look at the decorator and strategy patterns.
Objects in Python can change their class by setting the __class__ attribute. Otherwise, use the Strategy pattern.
I wonder if subclassing is really the best solution here. A property (enum, probably) that has different types of people as its possible values is one alternative. Or, for that matter, a derived property or method that tells you the type of person based on the age.
Javascript can do this. At any time you can take an existing object and add new methods to it, or change its existing methods. This can be done at the individual object level.
Douglas Crockford writes about this in Classical Inheritance in JavaScript:
Class Augmentation
JavaScript's dynamism allows us to add
or replace methods of an existing
class. We can call the method method
at any time, and all present and
future instances of the class will
have that method. We can literally
extend a class at any time.
Inheritance works retroactively. We
call this Class Augmentation to avoid
confusion with Java's extends, which
means something else.
Object Augmentation
In the static object-oriented
languages, if you want an object which
is slightly different than another
object, you need to define a new
class. In JavaScript, you can add
methods to individual objects without
the need for additional classes. This
has enormous power because you can
write far fewer classes and the
classes you do write can be much
simpler. Recall that JavaScript
objects are like hashtables. You
can add new values at any time. If the
value is a function, then it becomes a
method.
Common Lisp can: use the generic function CHANGE-CLASS.
I am surprised no one so far seemed to notice that this is the exact case for the State design pattern (although #Fadrian in fact described the core idea of the pattern quite precisely - without mentioning its name).
The state pattern is a behavioral software design pattern, also known as
the objects for states pattern. This pattern is used in computer
programming to represent the state of an object. This is a clean way for an
object to partially change its type at runtime.
The referenced page gives examples in Java and Python. Obviously it can be implemented in other strongly typed languages as well. (OTOH weakly typed languages have no need for State, as these support such behaviour out of the box.)

Is a Class special when it has no members?

I just realize some of my classes have no members. It has several public functions and maybe private functions and everything is passes through params. I realize functional programmers do this all the time but is this class considered special if it access nothing outside of the class and only uses its params for reading (except for out params and return values)?
I know this class can be static but static classes can modify outside variables. I want to know if this is a technique or maybe if a language may give additional benefits for writing it this way and etc.
-edit- This is looking like a wiki so lets make it one.
It is just called "stateless". Nothing really special about it.
There is nothing wrong with a class that has no members; controllers do this very frequently.
Yes, you could go static, but by not being static you allow for inheritance from your memberless class, which could add members along the way, if you so desired.
If there are no members, then there is no need for a class other than having a namespace. If you were programming in Python, then you would just put those methods into a module and don't bother with a class. If you are working in Java, then a a class is a must. If you are working in C++, it's up to you - but maybe you should consider using just a namespace, instead of a class, to make it less confusing.
Yes, this makes the class completely thread safe and thus no locking is required. To me, that is a fantastic attribute.
Sane programming languages allow you to define functions outside of classes when the functions do not require any persistent data - if you can define it in an appropriate namespace, all the better. If your language does not allow that, at least define them in a static class so it's clear that no state is accessed or mutated. Overall, though, this reminds me of an excellent article on the illogical abuse of classes in the name of "pure OOP".
I'd make the class static. I don't see what advantage it would give to keep it non-static. But then again - I'm a .NET developer, not Java. The languages are close, but there are many subtle differences I'm not aware of.
Remember that all methods of your class (even stateless) have one special variable -- pointer/reference to object - this (self, whatever) for which they are applied to.
Thus it is perfect sense in such stateless class if its methods could be overridden: in this case you have to have class to provide dispatching by this.
(Of course it's just emulating of first-class functions, so if your language already has ones it's no sense in this technique.)
At the moment I can't imagine why would you need stateless class without any virtual method.
Unless you want to have nice auto-complete in your IDE by typing objectName and dot :)
its simple class there is no specialty in it.
But i dont understand what is the use of having public or private methods when there in no member in it. because member methods are those which acts on particular instance's state.
Yes you can have static methods in it.