🚀 go-pugleaf

Hamish McNeish wrote:

> OK here's the plan,
>
> I want to use my constructor to construct a new Object if one does not
> exist otherwise I want to return a reference to an Object that matches
> the Objects criteria.
>
> Can I do this in a constructor? If so how?

No. Not in the constructor.
To do what  you plan to do, check out how JBuilders data modules work.

The basic strategy is to put in your class (MyClass) a static instance of
MyClass, and a static method MyClass gimmeMyClass(), which
returns or initializes the static instance as needed. Then use gimmeMyClass()
to get an (the) instance of the object, not the constructor.

>
> I tried to assign this to the object but my assignment is ignored
> Extent t = this;
> t = theObject;

It looks like you are trying to do pointer assignments.
Forget those nasty C-habits and join the object-oriented world of Java :-)

Extent t = this;
   // t now references the same object as this
t = anotherObject;
  // t now references anotherObject, and has forgotten everything it ever
  // knew about "this" ,
  // so anotherObject and "this" have nothing to do with each other.

>
> however this <> theObject( )
>
> I'm guessing I can't do this in a Constructor, but I'm hoping someone
> can tell me otherwise.