Summary

A new method is added to com.sun.source.util.DocTrees to obtain the TypeMirror representing the type referred to by a node represented by a DocTreePath.

Problem

The DocTrees API currently provides a getElement(DocTreePath) method that returns the Element referred to by a DocTree node. However, parameterized generic types such as java.util.List<String> cannot be represented as Elements, so converting the return value to a type returns the raw type.

Solution

Provide a new method to the DocTrees class that returns the TypeMirror instance representing the type referred to by a DocTreePath, or null if the DocTreePath does not refer to a type. If the referred type is a parameterized type the type arguments are represented in the returned TypeMirror instance.

Specification

The following method is added to the DocTrees class:

/**
 * Returns the language model type referred to by the leaf node of the given
 * {@link DocTreePath}, or {@code null} if unknown. This method usually
 * returns the same value as {@code getElement(path).asType()} for a
 * {@code path} argument for which {@link #getElement(DocTreePath)} returns
 * a non-null value, but may return a type that includes additional
 * information, such as a parameterized generic type instead of a raw type.
 *
 * @param path the path for the tree node
 * @return the referenced type, or null
 *
 * @since 15
 */
public abstract TypeMirror getType(DocTreePath path);