Name: bsC130419 Date: 05/17/2001


This is a feature request.

When calling Java methods, I find that I very frequently pass constants defined
within the object whose method is being invoked. Qualifying these constants,
whether with the class or the instance variable results in much tedious typing,
and much harder-to-read code.

It would be nice if one could pass such constants without qualification.

For example, on a record oriented database API:

    DatabaseFile inputFile=new DatabaseFile("abc.dbf");
    inputFile.read(DatabaseFile.NEXT,DatabaseFile.LOCK);

would become

    DatabaseFile inputFile=new DatabaseFile("abc.dbf");
    inputFile.read(NEXT,LOCK);

Identifiers passed as parameters to a method could be implicitly qualified
by the object in which the method resides.

I would propose that ambiguous references result in a compiler error,
and the program should explicitly qualify those, only (e.g. from above,
inputFile.read(DatabaseFile.NEXT,LOCK) or inputFile.read(NEXT,this.LOCK))

Another alternative would be for Java to provide an easy way to import all the
public property and/or method references in a nominated class with something
similar to the import <package> statement. Again, subsequent ambiguous
references would be bounced. For example:

    import public properties com.mycompany.mypackage.MyClass;
    import public methods com.mycompany.mypackage.MyClass;
    import public com.mycompany.mypackage.MyClass;

Ditto for protected??

    import protected properties com.mycompany.mypackage.MyClass;
    import protected methods com.mycompany.mypackage.MyClass;
    import protected com.mycompany.mypackage.MyClass;

And, add a new optional qualifyer "package" for importing package level
identifiers?

    import package properties com.mycompany.mypackage.MyClass;
    import package methods com.mycompany.mypackage.MyClass;
    import package com.mycompany.mypackage.MyClass;

What do you think? An idea you can build on, perhaps?
(Review ID: 124513)
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