Making a reference to set type functions in Java

Question

I'm making a generic abstract class that will work with float and integer values and will use different algorithms to generate a new value. It relies heavily on picking a random value within range, so I wanted to make a generic RandomRange kind of function.

This is the example of my code and what I'm trying to achieve.

public abstract class SelectionAlgorythm < T > {
  protected static Random random = new Random();
  BiFunction < T, T, T > picker;

  RangePair pair;

  public abstract T value();

  protected SelectionAlgorythm(RangePair < T > pair) {
    this.pair = pair
    if (pair.minRange instanceof Integer) {
      picker = SelectionAlgorythm::pickRandomInt;
    } else if (pair.minRange instanceof Float) {
      picker = SelectionAlgorythm::pickRandomFloat;
    }
  }

  private static Integer pickRandomInt(Integer val1, Integer val2) {
    return random.nextInt((int) val2 - (int) val1) + (int) val1;
  }

  private static Float pickRandomFloat(Float val1, Float val2) {
    return random.nextFloat() * (val2 - val1) + val1;
  }

  public T pickValue() {
    return picker(pair.minRange, pair.maxRange);
  }
}

However I run into problems here and I can't figure out how to fix them. If I leave the code as it is, then the picker initialization lines complain that "Incompatible types, T is not convertible to Integer"

But I also can't just make the functions themselves generic, because random.nextInt() and random.nextFloat() expect particular values, not generics.

How do I do that? I admit, I have not worked with generics much and kind of moved away from Java recently, so I may be missing something obvious.

Can you give us more context to why this has to be one method? — Dale, Aug 12 '23 at 14:01

score 4 · Accepted Answer · answered Aug 12 '23 at 14:14

You can’t do it in constructor code. There is no way to change the meaning of T at runtime using code. Generic types are enforced by the compiler, not at runtime.

If this weren’t an abstract class, I would suggest that you make the constructor private, and create public static factory methods as a way to let allow code construct instances.

Since it is an abstract class, you can just make the picker function a parameter:

protected SelectionAlgorythm(RangePair<T> pair,
                             BinaryOperator<T> picker)
{
    this.pair = pair;
    this.picker = picker;
}

(Note that BinaryOperator is the same as a BiFunction where all types are the same, but is easier to read.)

If you want to restrict which picker functions are allowed, create your own inner pseudo-enum class:

protected static final class Picker<V> {
    private final BinaryOperator<V> function;

    private Picker(BinaryOperator<V> function) {
        this.function = function;
    }

    BinaryOperation<V> function() {
        return function;
    }

    public static final Picker<Integer> INT =
        new Picker<>(SelectionAlgorythm::pickRandomInt);

    public static final Picker<Float> FLOAT =
        new Picker<>(SelectionAlgorythm::pickRandomFloat);
}

This will be typesafe since no class other than SelectionAlgorythm is capable of creating Picker instances:

protected SelectionAlgorythm(RangePair<T> pair,
                             Picker<T> picker)
{
    this.pair = pair;
    this.picker = picker.function();
}

Yep, I was just going to post my own answer in a similar venue, but I like yours even better. Cheers! — Vlad Vyatkin, Aug 12 '23 at 14:29
One of those answers that makes me upvote the question too. A real deep-dive is to enter the world of 'number systems'. Which java doesn't have in `java.*`, and I'm not aware of a commonly used library. You'd need the concept of a `NumericSystem` which has functions like `public T plus(T a, T b)`, `public T randomBetween(T lowIncl, T highExcl)`, and so on. It gets very complex very quickly, a DRY approach like this answer is almost always a much better idea. — rzwitserloot, Aug 12 '23 at 14:45

Making a reference to set type functions in Java

1 Answers1