Anon methods passed as event handlers?

[David Heffernan 2345]

1 hour ago, Rudy Velthuis said:

C# delegates are terribly complex, and that is why they work the way they do. Delphi has more or less lightweight implementations for procedural and method types. Good for us.

 

So I'll repeat it:  If people want the complexity of C#, then they should use C#.

They really aren't complex at all to use. Which is my point. You are talking about the implementation details.

 

If you find C# complex then that's on you. Since you declared a few comments back that you didn't really have a sound grasp of C# delegates perhaps you should become knowledgeable on the subject before acting like an expert. Just a thought. 

 

Myself, I don't find C# delegates at all complex. It would certainly be pretty convenient if you could use anon methods as event handlers, as you can trivially do in C#. I understand why you can't in Delphi and it's too late to change now. But when you write code in other languages that don't have backwards compatability constraints, it can be irritating when you come back to Delphi. 

[Rudy Velthuis 91]

19 hours ago, David Heffernan said:

David is making a good point here. If Emba were starting from scratch here, would they end up with all these different incompatible procedural types? I doubt it. 

Yes, I guess so (i.e, I don't doubt it). You can assign a normal procedural type and a method to a "reference to" pointer, but the latter is not really a simple type. Compared to them, procedural types and method pointers are far more lightweight.

 

If they had used something like anonmeths for events from the start, I am sure that people would already have called for simpler types instead, like what we have now.

Edited May 4, 2019 by Rudy Velthuis

[Rudy Velthuis 91]

2 hours ago, David Heffernan said:

They really aren't complex at all to use. Which is my point. You are talking about the implementation details.

 

If the "implementation details" make them much heavier (i.e. have much more overhead), because they require the

generation of an object and an interface and the capture of local variables, then these details do matter.

 

The current types are also easy enough to use. Yes, there is sometimes confusion about the fact you can't assign

a simple prodcedure to an event, but that is it. That is is not a good reason to use all these complex types everywhere. 

 

Heck, even if a proper event method explicitly has to call a simple procedure, then that is still far less overhead than

an anonmeth.

Edited May 4, 2019 by Rudy Velthuis

[Chris Rolliston 1]

By the by, this historical piece is quite an amusing read:

 

https://web.archive.org/web/20120627043929/http://java.sun.com/docs/white/delegates.html

 

Sun's reply to Microsoft adding delegate types to its Windows-centric version of Java (Visual J++ being Anders Hejlsberg's main project in between Delphi and C# I think...?).

[Rudy Velthuis 91]

1 hour ago, Chris Rolliston said:

By the by, this historical piece is quite an amusing read:

 

https://web.archive.org/web/20120627043929/http://java.sun.com/docs/white/delegates.html

 

Sun's reply to Microsoft adding delegate types to its Windows-centric version of Java (Visual J++ being Anders Hejlsberg's main project in between Delphi and C# I think...?).

Quote

This decision was made in consultation with Borland International, who had previous experience with bound method references in Delphi Object Pascal.

LOL!

 

It seems they mean method pointers in Delphi, especially how they were used for events, and they don't want them. Ok, their decision.

 

When I first saw events at work (a demo at CeBit 1995) I was impressed. The VCL and especially the way properties and events worked were the main reason I ordered Delphi 1 at the spot. I don't care if they are pure OOP (I actually don't see why not).

[Remy Lebeau 1396]

11 hours ago, Rudy Velthuis said:

Also, an event needs two things: an object and a code pointer. It can't do without. A plain or static function does not have those, An anonymous method does not necessarily have these either.

And yet, it CAN be done with plain/static functions.  I do it all the time when writing test apps that have no UIs.  It is just a matter of adding an explicit Self parameter to the function, populating a TMethod record with the address of the function in the Code field and an arbitrary value in the Data field, and then assigning that TMethod to the target event via a type-cast.

[uligerhardt 18]

9 hours ago, Remy Lebeau said:

And yet, it CAN be done with plain/static functions.  I do it all the time when writing test apps that have no UIs.  It is just a matter of adding an explicit Self parameter to the function, populating a TMethod record with the address of the function in the Code field and an arbitrary value in the Data field, and then assigning that TMethod to the target event via a type-cast.

FWIW: If I have to adapt the interface of the routine anyway I would make it into a (non-static) class method of a dummy class and stay completely inside of the type system.

[Rudy Velthuis 91]

19 hours ago, Remy Lebeau said:

And yet, it CAN be done with plain/static functions.  I do it all the time when writing test apps that have no UIs.  It is just a matter of adding an explicit Self parameter to the function, populating a TMethod record with the address of the function in the Code field and an arbitrary value in the Data field, and then assigning that TMethod to the target event via a type-cast.

Yeah, well, you can do a lot when cheating.

[Rudy Velthuis 91]

10 hours ago, uligerhardt said:

FWIW: If I have to adapt the interface of the routine anyway I would make it into a (non-static) class method of a dummy class and stay completely inside of the type system.

Yes, indeed, so would I. But you have to create and free those, to really stay inside the type system.

[uligerhardt 18]

10 hours ago, Rudy Velthuis said:

Yes, indeed, so would I. But you have to create and free those, to really stay inside the type system.

No, that's why I'm talking about class methods. You can use them like this:

type
  TMyEventHandler = class
  public
    class procedure OnError(const AMessage: string);
  end;

Something.OnError := TMyEventHandler.OnError;

The method has to be non-static to provide the needed Self parameter.

Edited May 6, 2019 by uligerhardt
Typo, syntax highlighting, clarification

[Rudy Velthuis 91]

3 hours ago, uligerhardt said:

No, that's why I'm talking about class methods. You can use them like this:

type
  TMyEventHandler = class
  public
    class procedure OnError(const AMessage: string);
  end;

Something.OnError := TMyEventHandler.OnError;

The method has to be non-static to provide the needed Self parameter.

Oh, Ok, I understand what you mean. Yes, that's possible.

[Remy Lebeau 1396]

On 5/5/2019 at 2:51 AM, uligerhardt said:

I would make it into a (non-static) class method of a dummy class and stay completely inside of the type system.

Sometimes I do that, too.  But writing a class to wrap a standalone function is not always as convenient as just using the function by itself.

[Remy Lebeau 1396]

On 5/5/2019 at 1:30 PM, Rudy Velthuis said:

Yes, indeed, so would I. But you have to create and free those, to really stay inside the type system.

You don't have to create instances of the class if you use a non-static 'class' method for the event handler.  It still has an implicit Self parameter, but it points to the class type instead of an object instance.  Works fine with events, as long as the method doesn't need to access any members of a particular object instance.

[Rudy Velthuis 91]

1 hour ago, Remy Lebeau said:

You don't have to create instances of the class if you use a non-static 'class' method for the event handler.

Yes, I got that already, thanks.