public interface JmeCloneable
extends java.lang.Cloneable
For example, if an object wishes to deep clone one of its fields then it will call cloner.clone(object) instead of object.clone(). The cloner will keep track of any clones already created for 'object' and return that instead of a new clone.
Cloning of a JmeCloneable object is done in two parts. First, the standard Java clone() method is called to create a shallow clone of the object. Second, the cloner will call the cloneFields() method to let the object deep clone any of its fields that should be cloned.
This two part process is necessary to facilitate circular references. When an object calls cloner.clone() during its cloneFields() method, it may get only a shallow copy that will be filled in later.
Modifier and Type | Method and Description |
---|---|
void |
cloneFields(Cloner cloner,
java.lang.Object original)
Implemented to perform deep cloning for this object, resolving
local cloned references using the specified cloner.
|
java.lang.Object |
jmeClone()
Performs a regular shallow clone of the object.
|
java.lang.Object jmeClone()
This method is separate from the regular clone() method so that objects might still maintain their own regular java clone() semantics (perhaps even using Cloner for those methods). However, because Java's clone() has specific features in the sense of Object's clone() implementation, it's usually best to have some path for subclasses to bypass the public clone() method that might be cloning fields and instead get at the superclass protected clone() methods. For example, through super.jmeClone() or another protected clone method that some base class eventually calls super.clone() in.
void cloneFields(Cloner cloner, java.lang.Object original)
Note: during normal clone operations the original object will not be needed as the clone has already had all of the fields shallow copied.
cloner
- The cloner that is performing the cloning operation. The
cloneFields method can call back into the cloner to make
clones of its subordinate fields.original
- The original object from which this object was cloned.
This is provided for the very rare case that this object needs
to refer to its original for some reason. In general, all of
the relevant values should have been transferred during the
shallow clone, and this object need only clone what it wants.