Question

I have some components declared in MXML tags, with some properties and event handlers.
For some of them there is the need to re-instantiated, so I came up with the following architecture.

Array of components that will be re-instanciated at some poin:

<flint:forms>
    <fx:Component>
        <login:LoginForm loginClick="outerDocument.form_loginClick()" />
    </fx:Component>
    <fx:Component>
        <config:CustomizerWizard close="outerDocument.init()" />
    </fx:Component>
</flint:forms>

At some point in my controller when I need a brand new “LoginForm”:

public var form:LoginForm;
...
form = ReDo(LoginForm);

The ReDo function should look like this:

public function ReDo(classe:Class):* {

    for each (var factory:ClassFactory in forms) {
        if (factory.generator == classe) return factory.newInstance();
    }
}

But it does’t work as I would like it to. The class created by the Flex compiler for every tag its not compatible with the actual class that is declared in it.

I tried to create my own tag, but the compiler won’t let me use it in the same way that can. (Complains that it’s not a container)

Is there a way to use a custom ClassFactory class with a property that I could use in my ReDo function? Like this:

<flint:forms>
    <flint:MyComponent type="loginForm">
        <login:LoginForm loginClick="outerDocument.form_loginClick()" />
    </flint:Component>
    <flint:MyComponent type="wizard">
        <config:CustomizerWizard close="outerDocument.init()" />
    </flint:Component>
</flint:forms>

Or instead of the custom ClassFactory, try to cast/convert the ClassFactory.generator property to something that can be expected, not some random class name that it has righ now?

Edit

Instead of comparing both Class variables (which I think it’s the best aproach), I could instantiate every component in the list and compare if its the type that I want.

public function ReDo(classe:Class):* {

    for each (var factory:ClassFactory in forms) {
        var obj:* = factory.newInstance();
        if (obj is classe) return obj;
        //if (factory.generator == classe) return factory.newInstance();
    }
}

That would be the only change in my code, but isn’t it wasteful? Would GC be smart enough to cleanup all the obj’s that don’t pass the “if”?

Answer 1

If you make events buddle and move handlers a level higher:

addEventListener(LoginEvent.LOGIN_CLICK, ...);
addEventListener(WizardEvent.CLOSE, ...);

then you can write basically:

<flint:forms>
    <login:LoginForm id="loginForm" />
    <config:CustomizerWizard id="wizard" />
</flint:forms>

And then:

public function ReDo(classe:Class):* {
    return new classe();
}

Another (and more correct) approach is using a separate factory function for each component:

public function createLoginForm():LoginForm {
    var loginForm:LoginForm = new LoginForm();
    loginForm.addEventListener(LoginEvent.LOGIN_CLICK, ...);
    return loginForm;
}