Re: Simple property rules

On 2 Apr 2004, at 03:10, Bill Burdick wrote:
> Maybe the problem with properties is that Groovy automagically defines 
> get and set methods.  What about just not having Groovy create get/set 
> methods and using rules like these for behavior of field syntax:
>
> 1) this.field directly accesses field, not the get/set methods (only 
> when using 'this')

Right now using 'field' or 'this.field' will access the field not the 
property.

> 2) if there are no get/set methods use the field behaves just like a 
> regular Java field
> 3) if there is a get method or a set method, use the standard bean 
> introspection rules

I think today the only way to use the getters/setters is to be outside 
of the class. i.e. inside the class 'field' refers to the field. If 
you're outside the class foo.field uses the getter/setter (i.e. the 
field will be invisible so it'll use the getter/setter instead).

> This lets you make a 'backdoor' if you absoultely need to bypass a 
> get/set method by creating alternate methods in a class that  access 
> its fields using 'this.x' instead of 'x' (you could even add these 
> methods to someone else's code at runtime if you had to).

Agreed.

Though I confess to really wanting to be able to define simple beans, 
easily like this

class Customer {
     String name
     Integer id
     Date dob
     Address address
}

without writing reams of getter-setters. Where the above could be 
improved is maybe using some syntax sugar to specify specific 
getter/setter implementations - like C#'s syntax.

James
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