Question

I often use the class-factory pattern whereby a class has a private constructor and a static method to create the class. This allows for the situation where the class cannot be constructed for some reason, and a null is returned – very handy.

I would like to be able to extend this to a factory method which creates a particular class from a hierarchy of derived classes depending on conditions. However I can’t see a way of then hiding the constructors of the derived classes to force the use of the factory method. If the factory method is in the base class it no longer has access to the private constructors of derived classes. Putting a factory method in every derived class doesn’t work as the required type must then be known beforehand. Nested classes might be a way if a class had access to the private members of a nested class, but sadly it seems that the nested classes have access to the private members of the enclosing class, but not the other way round.

Does anyone know of a way of doing this?

Answer 1

Here’s the sample code I was working on when Daniel posted his answer. It looks like it’s doing what he suggested:

public static class BaseFactory
{
    public static Base Create(bool condition)
    {
        if (condition)
        {
            return Derived1.Create(1, "TEST");
        }
        else
        {
            return Derived2.Create(1, DateTime.Now);
        }
    }
}

public class Base
{
    protected Base(int value)
    {
    }

    protected static Base Create(int value)
    {
        return new Base(value);
    }
}

public sealed class Derived1: Base
{
    private Derived1(int value, string text): base(value)
    {
    }

    internal static Derived1 Create(int value, string text)
    {
        return new Derived1(value, text);
    }
}

public sealed class Derived2: Base
{
    private Derived2(int value, DateTime time): base(value)
    {
    }

    internal static Derived2 Create(int value, DateTime time)
    {
        return new Derived2(value, time);
    }
}

[EDIT] And for Daniel’s second suggestion:

public static class BaseFactory
{
    public static Base Create(bool condition)
    {
        if (condition)
        {
            return new Derived1Creator(1, "TEST");
        }
        else
        {
            return new Derived2Creator(1, DateTime.Now);
        }
    }

    private sealed class Derived1Creator: Derived1
    {
        public Derived1Creator(int value, string text): base(value, text)
        {
        }
    }

    private sealed class Derived2Creator: Derived2
    {
        public Derived2Creator(int value, DateTime time): base(value, time)
        {
        }
    }
}

public class Base
{
    protected Base(int value)
    {
    }

    protected static Base Create(int value)
    {
        return new Base(value);
    }
}

public class Derived1: Base
{
    protected Derived1(int value, string text): base(value)
    {
    }

    protected static Derived1 Create(int value, string text)
    {
        return new Derived1(value, text);
    }
}

public class Derived2: Base
{
    protected Derived2(int value, DateTime time): base(value)
    {
    }

    protected static Derived2 Create(int value, DateTime time)
    {
        return new Derived2(value, time);
    }
}

Note that this second approach means that the classes can’t be sealed, unfortunately.