Java implementations of the Prototype Pattern

Question

What implementations of the Prototype Pattern exist on the Java platform?

A prototype pattern is a creational design pattern used in software development when the type of objects to create is determined by a prototypical instance, which is cloned to produce new objects.

Prototype based programming:

Prototype-based programming is a style of object-oriented programming in which classes are not present, and behavior reuse (known as inheritance in class-based languages) is performed via a process of cloning existing objects that serve as prototypes.

The implementation should be aware that some Java objects are mutable, and some are immutable (see Mutable vs Immutable objects).

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Oct 23 '08 at 09:50

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According to Josh Bloch and Doug Lea, Cloneable is broken. In that case, you can use a copy constructor.

answered Oct 23 '08 at 09:50

jamesh

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Thanks for this link - I've also added a reference to mutable/immutable objects in the question. – devstopfix Oct 23 '08 at 10:04
`Object.clone` is broken. But cloning manually is still fine. – Tom Hawtin - tackline Oct 23 '08 at 13:40
This distinction really is what I wanted to suggest. ie Cloneable as a marker interface, and void clone throws CloneNotSupportedException – jamesh Jan 12 '09 at 19:06

devstopfix · Answer 2 · 2008-10-23T09:59:26.223

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Java defines the Cloneable interface, described here at JGuru

Java provides a simple interface named Cloneable that provides an implementation of the Prototype pattern. If you have an object that is Cloneable, you can call its clone() method to create a new instance of the object with the same values.

Warning: see Cloneable is broken

edited Oct 23 '08 at 09:59

answered Oct 23 '08 at 09:35

devstopfix

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score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Oct 23 '08 at 09:36

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Steve Yegge describes the Eclipse implementation of the ASTNode

answered Oct 23 '08 at 09:36

devstopfix

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Java implementations of the Prototype Pattern

3 Answers3