Class LambdaMetafactory

Methods to facilitate the creation of simple "function objects" that implement one or more interfaces by delegation to a provided MethodHandle, possibly after type adaptation and partial evaluation of arguments. These methods are typically used as bootstrap methods for invokedynamic call sites, to support the lambda expression and method reference expression features of the Java Programming Language.

Indirect access to the behavior specified by the provided MethodHandle proceeds in order through three phases:

• Linkage occurs when the methods in this class are invoked. They take as arguments an interface to be implemented (typically a functional interface, one with a single abstract method), a name and signature of a method from that interface to be implemented, a method handle describing the desired implementation behavior for that method, and possibly other additional metadata, and produce a CallSite whose target can be used to create suitable function objects. Linkage may involve dynamically loading a new class that implements the target interface. The CallSite can be considered a "factory" for function objects and so these linkage methods are referred to as "metafactories".
• Capture occurs when the CallSite's target is invoked, typically through an invokedynamic call site, producing a function object. This may occur many times for a single factory CallSite. Capture may involve allocation of a new function object, or may return an existing function object. The behavior MethodHandle may have additional parameters beyond those of the specified interface method; these are referred to as captured parameters, which must be provided as arguments to the CallSite target, and which may be early-bound to the behavior MethodHandle. The number of captured parameters and their types are determined during linkage.
• Invocation occurs when an implemented interface method is invoked on a function object. This may occur many times for a single function object. The method referenced by the behavior MethodHandle is invoked with the captured arguments and any additional arguments provided on invocation, as if by MethodHandle.invoke(Object...).

It is sometimes useful to restrict the set of inputs or results permitted at invocation. For example, when the generic interface Predicate<T> is parameterized as Predicate<String>, the input must be a String, even though the method to implement allows any Object. At linkage time, an additional MethodType parameter describes the "instantiated" method type; on invocation, the arguments and eventual result are checked against this MethodType.

This class provides two forms of linkage methods: a standard version (metafactory(MethodHandles.Lookup, String, MethodType, MethodType, MethodHandle, MethodType)) using an optimized protocol, and an alternate version altMetafactory(MethodHandles.Lookup, String, MethodType, Object...)). The alternate version is a generalization of the standard version, providing additional control over the behavior of the generated function objects via flags and additional arguments. The alternate version adds the ability to manage the following attributes of function objects:

• Bridging. It is sometimes useful to implement multiple variations of the method signature, involving argument or return type adaptation. This occurs when multiple distinct VM signatures for a method are logically considered to be the same method by the language. The flag FLAG_BRIDGES indicates that a list of additional MethodTypes will be provided, each of which will be implemented by the resulting function object. These methods will share the same name and instantiated type.
• Multiple interfaces. If needed, more than one interface can be implemented by the function object. (These additional interfaces are typically marker interfaces with no methods.) The flag FLAG_MARKERS indicates that a list of additional interfaces will be provided, each of which should be implemented by the resulting function object.
• Serializability. The generated function objects do not generally support serialization. If desired, FLAG_SERIALIZABLE can be used to indicate that the function objects should be serializable. Serializable function objects will use, as their serialized form, instances of the class SerializedLambda, which requires additional assistance from the capturing class (the class described by the MethodHandles.Lookup parameter caller); see SerializedLambda for details.

Assume the linkage arguments are as follows:

• invokedType (describing the CallSite signature) has K parameters of types (D1..Dk) and return type Rd;
• samMethodType (describing the implemented method type) has N parameters, of types (U1..Un) and return type Ru;
• implMethod (the MethodHandle providing the implementation has M parameters, of types (A1..Am) and return type Ra (if the method describes an instance method, the method type of this method handle already includes an extra first argument corresponding to the receiver);
• instantiatedMethodType (allowing restrictions on invocation) has N parameters, of types (T1..Tn) and return type Rt.

Then the following linkage invariants must hold:

• Rd is an interface
• implMethod is a direct method handle
• samMethodType and instantiatedMethodType have the same arity N, and for i=1..N, Ti and Ui are the same type, or Ti and Ui are both reference types and Ti is a subtype of Ui
• Either Rt and Ru are the same type, or both are reference types and Rt is a subtype of Ru
• K + N = M
• For i=1..K, Di = Ai
• For i=1..N, Ti is adaptable to Aj, where j=i+k
• The return type Rt is void, or the return type Ra is not void and is adaptable to Rt

Further, at capture time, if implMethod corresponds to an instance method, and there are any capture arguments (K > 0), then the first capture argument (corresponding to the receiver) must be non-null.

A type Q is considered adaptable to S as follows:

Fields

FLAG_SERIALIZABLE

public static final int FLAG_SERIALIZABLE

Flag for alternate metafactories indicating the lambda object must be serializable

See Also:

Constant Field Values

FLAG_MARKERS

public static final int FLAG_MARKERS

Flag for alternate metafactories indicating the lambda object implements other marker interfaces besides Serializable

See Also:

Constant Field Values

FLAG_BRIDGES

public static final int FLAG_BRIDGES

Flag for alternate metafactories indicating the lambda object requires additional bridge methods

See Also:

Constant Field Values

Constructors

LambdaMetafactory

public LambdaMetafactory()

Methods

metafactory

public static CallSite metafactory(MethodHandles.Lookup caller,
                                   String invokedName,
                                   MethodType invokedType,
                                   MethodType samMethodType,
                                   MethodHandle implMethod,
                                   MethodType instantiatedMethodType)
                            throws LambdaConversionException

Parameters:

caller - Represents a lookup context with the accessibility privileges of the caller. When used with invokedynamic, this is stacked automatically by the VM.

invokedName - The name of the method to implement. When used with invokedynamic, this is provided by the NameAndType of the InvokeDynamic structure and is stacked automatically by the VM.

invokedType - The expected signature of the CallSite. The parameter types represent the types of capture variables; the return type is the interface to implement. When used with invokedynamic, this is provided by the NameAndType of the InvokeDynamic structure and is stacked automatically by the VM. In the event that the implementation method is an instance method and this signature has any parameters, the first parameter in the invocation signature must correspond to the receiver.

samMethodType - Signature and return type of method to be implemented by the function object.

implMethod - A direct method handle describing the implementation method which should be called (with suitable adaptation of argument types, return types, and with captured arguments prepended to the invocation arguments) at invocation time.

instantiatedMethodType - The signature and return type that should be enforced dynamically at invocation time. This may be the same as samMethodType, or may be a specialization of it.

Returns:

a CallSite whose target can be used to perform capture, generating instances of the interface named by invokedType

Throws:

LambdaConversionException - If any of the linkage invariants described above are violated

altMetafactory

public static CallSite altMetafactory(MethodHandles.Lookup caller,
                                      String invokedName,
                                      MethodType invokedType,
                                      Object... args)
                               throws LambdaConversionException

CallSite altMetafactory(MethodHandles.Lookup caller,
                          String invokedName,
                          MethodType invokedType,
                          Object... args)

CallSite altMetafactory(MethodHandles.Lookup caller,
                          String invokedName,
                          MethodType invokedType,
                          MethodType samMethodType,
                          MethodHandle implMethod,
                          MethodType instantiatedMethodType,
                          int flags,
                          int markerInterfaceCount,  // IF flags has MARKERS set
                          Class... markerInterfaces, // IF flags has MARKERS set
                          int bridgeCount,           // IF flags has BRIDGES set
                          MethodType... bridges      // IF flags has BRIDGES set
                          )

Parameters:

caller - Represents a lookup context with the accessibility privileges of the caller. When used with invokedynamic, this is stacked automatically by the VM.

invokedName - The name of the method to implement. When used with invokedynamic, this is provided by the NameAndType of the InvokeDynamic structure and is stacked automatically by the VM.

invokedType - The expected signature of the CallSite. The parameter types represent the types of capture variables; the return type is the interface to implement. When used with invokedynamic, this is provided by the NameAndType of the InvokeDynamic structure and is stacked automatically by the VM. In the event that the implementation method is an instance method and this signature has any parameters, the first parameter in the invocation signature must correspond to the receiver.

args - An Object[] array containing the required arguments samMethodType, implMethod, instantiatedMethodType, flags, and any optional arguments, as described altMetafactory(MethodHandles.Lookup, String, MethodType, Object...) above}

Returns:

a CallSite whose target can be used to perform capture, generating instances of the interface named by invokedType

Throws:

LambdaConversionException - If any of the linkage invariants described above are violated