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"Key-Value Coding" for Java

In Objective-C on Apple there is something called "Key-Value Coding" that allows you to traverse the object graph using strings similar to filesystem paths. There's an informal protocol (i.e. interface) that allows objects to return values based on the "key" they're asked for. e.g. The default is to return the value of a field named by the key, while relational collections like NSDictionaries can implement more interesting behavior.

Pseudo code example:

foo.bar = new baz();
foo.bar.mymap = new map();
foo.bar.mymap['bom'] = 2;

foo.valueForKeyPath("bar.mymap.bom") # 2

Is there anything like this for Java? It would be easy enough to implement, but I thought I'd look first.

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spieden Avatar asked Oct 21 '09 23:10

spieden


3 Answers

PropertyUtils.getProperty, from apache's beanutils library, does this for JavaBean properties.

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meriton Avatar answered Nov 13 '22 19:11

meriton


Hmm, well, in case anyone else has this question, it looks like MVEL is a good bet:

http://mvel.codehaus.org/Property+Navigation

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spieden Avatar answered Nov 13 '22 20:11

spieden


The Ujorm is an open source Java library providing objects based on the key‑value architecture, see the examples.

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Paul Avatar answered Nov 13 '22 19:11

Paul