Run-time Modification of the Class Hierarchy in a Live Java Development Environment

Authors

Joel R. Brandt, Washington University in St. Louis
Kenneth J. Goldman, Washington University in St. Louis

Document Type

Technical Report

Publication Date

2004-09-01

Filename

wucse-2004-77.pdf

Technical Report Number

WUCSE-2004-77

Abstract

Class hierarchy design is central to object-oriented software development. However, it is sometimes difficult for developers to anticipate all the implications of a design until implementation is underway. To support experimentation with different designs, we extend prior work on live development environments to allow run-time modification of the class hierarchy. The result is a more fluid object-oriented development process, in which immediate feedback from the executing program can be used to guide hierarchy design. This paper presents a framework and developer support for run-time modification of class inheritance relations in JPie, a live visual programming environment for Java. Most notably, the framework supports class reloading without modification of the Java Virtual Machine.

Comments

Permanent URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.7936/K7NV9GKK

Recommended Citation

Brandt, Joel R. and Goldman, Kenneth J., "Run-time Modification of the Class Hierarchy in a Live Java Development Environment" Report Number: WUCSE-2004-77 (2004). All Computer Science and Engineering Research.
https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/cse_research/1047