cyclical generics (try 2)

Question

Second attempt at this question (the initial code wasn't enough to highlight the issue)

Here is the code that does not compile:

interface Player<R, G extends Game>
{
    R takeTurn(G game);
}

interface Game<P extends Player>
{
    void play(P player);
}

abstract class AbstractGame<R, P extends Player>
    implements Game<P>
{
    public final void play(final P player)
    {
        final R value;

        value = player.takeTurn(this);
        turnTaken(value);
    }

    protected abstract void turnTaken(R value);
}

public class XPlayer
    implements Player<Integer, XGame>
{
    @Override
    public Integer takeTurn(final XGame game)
    {
        return (42);
    }
}

public class XGame<P extends Player<Integer, XGame>>
    extends AbstractGame<Integer, XPlayer>
{
    @Override
    protected void turnTaken(final Integer value)
    {
        System.out.println("value = " + value);
    }
}

public class Main
{
    public static void main(final String[] argv) 
    {
        final XPlayer player;
        final XGame   game;

        player = new XPlayer();
        game   = new XGame();
        game.play(player);
    }
}

What I am running up against is trying to get the play method in the AbstractGame to compile. It seems that I have to run in circles with the Game and the Player adding generics to the extends/implements but for the life of me I cannot get it straight.

The play method has to be final in the AbstractGame class, and there is no way to do casting, and I don't want to write another method like the turnTaken one to get it to work if I don't have to.

EDIT: as requested here is the code that compiles, but needs the cast:

interface Player<R, P extends Player<R, P, G>, G extends Game<R, G, P>>
{
    R takeTurn(G game);
}

interface Game<R, G extends Game<R, G, P>, P extends Player<R, P, G>>
{
    void play(P player);
}

abstract class AbstractGame<R, G extends Game<R, G, P>, P extends Player<R, P, G>>
    implements Game<R, G, P>
{
    public final void play(final P player)
    {
        final R value;

        value = player.takeTurn((G)this);
        turnTaken(value);
    }

    protected abstract void turnTaken(R value);
}

class XPlayer
    implements Player<Integer, XPlayer, XGame>
{
    @Override
    public Integer takeTurn(final XGame game)
    {
        return (42);
    }
}

class XGame
    extends AbstractGame<Integer, XGame, XPlayer>
{
    @Override
    protected void turnTaken(final Integer value)
    {
        System.out.println("value = " + value);
    }
}

class Main
{
    public static void main(final String[] argv) 
    {
        final XPlayer player;
        final XGame   game;

        player = new XPlayer();
        game   = new XGame();
        game.play(player);
    }
}

Answer 1

As Paul Bellora points out, you're mixing generic and raw types -- and the correct, fully-generic solution is a bit of a mess and requires a lot of redundancy. There's no nice way (that I know of) to do circular (but not recursive) generics in Java.

Rather than struggling with this, I would make both Player and Game generic on just one parameter, the type of value being played with -- what you had as R.

interface Game<R> {
    void play(Player<? extends R> player);
}

interface Player<R> {
    R takeTurn(Game<? super R> game);
}

abstract class AbstractGame<R> implements Game<R> {
    public final void play(Player<? extends R> player) {
        final R value;

        value = player.takeTurn(this);
        turnTaken(value);
    }

    protected abstract void turnTaken(R value);
}

class XPlayer implements Player<Integer> {
    @Override
    public Integer takeTurn(Game<? super Integer> game) {
        return 42;
    }
}

class XGame extends AbstractGame<Integer> {
    @Override
    public void turnTaken(Integer value) {
        System.out.println("value = " + value);
    }
}

public class Main {
    public static void main(String[] argv) {
        XPlayer player = new XPlayer();
        XGame game = new XGame();
        game.play(player);
    }
}

Now, any player who knows how to take R-based moves can play any R-based game.

Answer 2

Mixing generics and raw types isn't going to work. If you need these interfaces to reference each other, they also need to reference themselves:

interface Player<R, P extends Player<R, P, G>, G extends Game<R, G, P>>
{
    R takeTurn(G game);
}

interface Game<R, G extends Game<R, G, P>, P extends Player<R, P, G>>
{
    void play(P player);
}

Although this is looking rather hairbrained, and I'm not sure why you need it.

Edit:

I was able to implement your AbstractGame based on the above:

abstract class AbstractGame<R, P extends Player<R, P, AbstractGame<R, P>>>
    implements Game<R, AbstractGame<R, P>, P>
{
    public final void play(final P player)
    {
        final R value;

        value = player.takeTurn(this);
        turnTaken(value);
    }

    protected abstract void turnTaken(R value);
}

However I couldn't quite close the circuit with XGame and XPlayer:

public class XGame
    extends AbstractGame<Integer, XPlayer> //compile error on XPlayer
{

    protected void turnTaken(Integer value) { }
}

public class XPlayer
    implements Player<Integer, XPlayer, XGame> //compile error on XGame
{
    @Override
    public Integer takeTurn(final XGame game)
    {
        return (42);
    }
}

The issue seems to be that each of the generic declarations of XGame and XPlayer needs the other to be correct. This is where your design is truly cyclical. If the compiler 'assumed' each was correct, it would in theory work. But it doesn't.

Edit 2:

How about this:

interface Game<R, G extends Game<R, G>>
{
    void play(Player<R, G> player);
}

interface Player<R, G extends Game<R, G>>
{
    R takeTurn(G game);
}

abstract class AbstractGame<R, G extends AbstractGame<R, G>>
    implements Game<R, G>
{
    public final void play(final Player<R, G> player)
    {
        final R value;

        value = player.takeTurn(self());
        turnTaken(value);
    }

    protected abstract G self();

    protected abstract void turnTaken(R value);
}

public final class XGame extends AbstractGame<Integer, XGame>
{
   protected XGame self() {
      return this;
   }

   protected void turnTaken(Integer value) { }
}

public class XPlayer implements Player<Integer, XGame>
{
    @Override
    public Integer takeTurn(final XGame game)
    {
       return (42);
    }
}

The key here was declaring an abstract method self() in AbstractGame that returns an instance of type G. Extending classes must resolve the inherited type parameter with their own type, and implement self() to return this. This is only suitable for internal code, since an extending class could easily lie, for example:

public class EvilGame extends AbstractGame<Integer, AnotherGame> { ... }

See my answer here and this post for more details on this pattern.