Pass Custom Type as a Method Parameter

Question

Is it possible to pass a custom type into a static method? I have two custom types and I'd like to pass in a custom type as the method parameter and then identify which type was passed in and run the appropriate class methods based on the type that was passed into the method:

public static void parseJSONResponse(string json, Type obj) {
    if(obj.getName() == 'MyClass1') {
        Type t = Type.forName(obj.getName());
        MmClass1 = (MyClass1)t.newInstance();
        parser = MyClass1.parse(json);
        //...handle results
    }
    else if(obj.getName() == 'MyClass2') {
        Type t = Type.forName(obj.getName());
        MyClass2 parser = (MyClass2)t.newInstance();
        parser = MyClass2.parse(json);
        //...handle results
    }
}

public static void run() {
    String POSTResponse = makeCallout();
    JSONParser parser = JSON.createParser(POSTResponse);
    MyClass1 postParser = new MyClass1(parser);
    parseJSONResponse(POSTResponse, postParser);
}

error:

Method does not exist or incorrect signature: void parseJSONResponse(String, myClass1) from the type MyService

I'm limiting the code included in this post due to the amount of lines. If I cannot pass a custom type as a method parameter, is there another option?

Answer 1

I think you are trying to use dynamic method dispatch. In this scenario, you don't have to check what's the type of instance created, you can call the parent's method without having to worry about which instance passed.

In order to achieve this, you have to create an interface and ensure all of the other parser classes implements it.

public interface IJSONParser{

  public Object parse(String json);
}


public class MyClass1 implements IJSONParser
{
    private JSONParser parser;

    public MyClass1(JSONParser parser){
        this.parser = parser;
    }

    public Object parse(String json){       
        return yourParsedObject;
    }

}

public class MyClass2 implements IJSONParser
{
    private JSONParser parser;

    public MyClass2(JSONParser parser){
        this.parser = parser;
    }
    public Object parse(String json){       
        return yourParsedObject;
    }


}

Once this setup is done you can use it as?

public static void parseJSONResponse(string json, IJSONParser obj) {
     parser = obj.parse(json);
     //...handle results
}

public static void run() {
    String POSTResponse = makeCallout();
    JSONParser parser = JSON.createParser(POSTResponse);
    MyClass1 postParser = new MyClass1(parser);
    parseJSONResponse(POSTResponse, postParser);
}