sun.reflect

Sub Packages:

sun.reflect.annotation
sun.reflect.generics.factory
sun.reflect.generics.parser
sun.reflect.generics.reflectiveObjects
sun.reflect.generics.repository
sun.reflect.generics.scope
sun.reflect.generics.tree
sun.reflect.generics.visitor
sun.reflect.misc

Interfaces:

ByteVector	A growable array of bytes.	code | html
ClassFileConstants	Minimal set of class file constants for assembly of field and method accessors.	code | html
ConstructorAccessor	This interface provides the declaration for java.lang.reflect.Constructor.invoke().	code | html
FieldAccessor	This interface provides the declarations for the accessor methods of java.lang.reflect.Field.	code | html
LangReflectAccess	An interface which gives privileged packages Java-level access to internals of java.lang.reflect.	code | html
MethodAccessor	This interface provides the declaration for java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke().	code | html

Abstract Classes:

ConstructorAccessorImpl	Package-private implementation of the ConstructorAccessor interface which has access to all classes and all fields, regardless of language restrictions.	code | html
FieldAccessorImpl	Package-private implementation of the FieldAccessor interface which has access to all classes and all fields, regardless of language restrictions.	code | html
MethodAccessorImpl	Package-private implementation of the MethodAccessor interface which has access to all classes and all fields, regardless of language restrictions.	code | html
SerializationConstructorAccessorImpl	Java serialization (in java.io) expects to be able to instantiate a class and invoke a no-arg constructor of that class's first non-Serializable superclass.	code | html
UnsafeFieldAccessorImpl	Base class for sun.misc.Unsafe-based FieldAccessors.	code | html
UnsafeQualifiedFieldAccessorImpl	Base class for sun.misc.Unsafe-based FieldAccessors for fields with final or volatile qualifiers.	code | html
UnsafeQualifiedStaticFieldAccessorImpl	Base class for sun.misc.Unsafe-based FieldAccessors for final or volatile static fields.	code | html
UnsafeStaticFieldAccessorImpl	Base class for sun.misc.Unsafe-based FieldAccessors for static fields.	code | html

Classes:

AccessorGenerator	Shared functionality for all accessor generators	code | html
BootstrapConstructorAccessorImpl	Uses Unsafe.allocateObject() to instantiate classes; only used for bootstrapping.	code | html
ByteVectorFactory		code | html
ByteVectorImpl		code | html
ClassDefiner	Utility class which assists in calling Unsafe.defineClass() by creating a new class loader which delegates to the one needed in order for proper resolution of the given bytecodes to occur.	code | html
ClassFileAssembler		code | html
ConstantPool	Provides reflective access to the constant pools of classes.	code | html
DelegatingClassLoader		code | html
DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl	Delegates its invocation to another ConstructorAccessorImpl and can change its delegate at run time.	code | html
DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl	Delegates its invocation to another MethodAccessorImpl and can change its delegate at run time.	code | html
FieldInfo	NOTE: obsolete as of JDK 1.4 B75 and should be removed from the workspace (FIXME)	code | html
InstantiationExceptionConstructorAccessorImpl	Throws an InstantiationException with given error message upon newInstance() call	code | html
Label	Allows forward references in bytecode streams emitted by ClassFileAssembler.	code | html
Label.PatchInfo		code | html
MagicAccessorImpl	MagicAccessorImpl (named for parity with FieldAccessorImpl and others, not because it actually implements an interface) is a marker class in the hierarchy.	code | html
MethodAccessorGenerator	Generator for sun.reflect.MethodAccessor and sun.reflect.ConstructorAccessor objects using bytecodes to implement reflection.	code | html
NativeConstructorAccessorImpl	Used only for the first few invocations of a Constructor; afterward, switches to bytecode-based implementation	code | html
NativeMethodAccessorImpl	Used only for the first few invocations of a Method; afterward, switches to bytecode-based implementation	code | html
Reflection	Common utility routines used by both java.lang and java.lang.reflect	code | html
ReflectionFactory	The master factory for all reflective objects, both those in java.lang.reflect (Fields, Methods, Constructors) as well as their delegates (FieldAccessors, MethodAccessors, ConstructorAccessors).	code | html
ReflectionFactory.GetReflectionFactoryAction	A convenience class for acquiring the capability to instantiate reflective objects.	code | html
SignatureIterator	Assists in iterating down a method's signature	code | html
UTF8	It is necessary to use a "bootstrap" UTF-8 encoder for encoding constant pool entries because the character set converters rely on Class.newInstance().	code | html
UnsafeBooleanFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeByteFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeCharacterFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeDoubleFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeFieldAccessorFactory		code | html
UnsafeFloatFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeIntegerFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeLongFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeObjectFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedBooleanFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedByteFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedCharacterFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedDoubleFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedFloatFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedIntegerFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedLongFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedObjectFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedShortFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedStaticBooleanFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedStaticByteFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedStaticCharacterFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedStaticDoubleFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedStaticFloatFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedStaticIntegerFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedStaticLongFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedStaticObjectFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeQualifiedStaticShortFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeShortFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeStaticBooleanFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeStaticByteFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeStaticCharacterFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeStaticDoubleFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeStaticFloatFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeStaticIntegerFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeStaticLongFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeStaticObjectFieldAccessorImpl		code | html
UnsafeStaticShortFieldAccessorImpl		code | html




Licensee impact of JDK 1.4 reflection changes

Sun's JDK 1.4 contains a new implementation of java.lang.reflect which offers substantially higher performance than previous JDKs' native code. Licensees can at their discretion port these changes. There are no public API or documentation changes associated with the new reflection implementation aside from a few minor clarifications in the specifications of Method.invoke(), Constructor.newInstance(), and a few methods in java.lang.reflect.Field.

The bulk of the new implementation is Java programming language code which generates bytecodes, and is therefore portable. If licensees desire to port it, the following JVM changes are required:

1. The following four new JVM entry points must be added:
   • JVM_GetClassDeclaredConstructors
   • JVM_GetClassDeclaredFields
   • JVM_GetClassDeclaredMethods
   • JVM_GetClassAccessFlags
   The first three return the declared constructors, fields, and methods for a given class, with an option to return only the public ones. They are similar in functionality to the earlier GetClassConstructors, GetClassFields, and GetClassMethods. JVM_GetClassDeclaredFields and JVM_GetClassDeclaredMethods must intern the Strings for the names of the Field and Method objects returned. The fouth returns the access flags for a given class as marked in the class file, as opposed to in the InnerClasses attribute if the class is an inner class, and therefore differs from JVM_GetClassModifiers for inner classes (most importantly, protected inner classes; see 4471811.)
2. The JVM's link resolver must be modified to allow all field and method references from subclasses of sun.reflect.MagicAccessorImpl to any other class (even to private members of other classes) to succeed. This allows setAccessible() and its associated checks to be implemented in Java.
3. The code which calls the verifier must skip verification for all subclasses of sun.reflect.MagicAccessorImpl. (It was originally intended that only a subset of the stub classes used for serialization would not pass the verifier, specifically, those subclassing SerializationConstructorAccessorImpl; see 4486457 for a case where this does not work.)
4. The stack walker for security checks must be modified to skip not only all Method.invoke() frames, but also any frames for which the class is a subclass of sun.reflect.MethodAccessorImpl.
5. The JVM entry points JVM_InvokeMethod and JVM_NewInstanceFromConstructor are currently still used because the first invocation of the bytecode-based reflection is currently slower than the original native code. The security checks they perform can, however, be disabled, as they are now performed by Java programming language code.

The following changes were discovered to be necessary for backward compatibility with certain applications (see bug 4474172):

1. The existing JVM entry point JVM_LatestUserDefinedLoader (typically used in applications which rely on the 1.1 security framework) must skip reflection-related frames in its stack walk: specifically all frames associated with subclasses of sun.reflect.MethodAccessorImpl and sun.reflect.ConstructorAccessorImpl.
2. The new reflection implementation can cause class loading to occur in previously-unexpected places (namely during reflective calls). This can cause class loaders which contain subtle bugs to break. In general it is not possible to guarantee complete backward bug compatibility, but one kind of bug has been observed more than once: the inability of a user-defined loader to handle delegation to it for a class it has already loaded. The new reflection implementation is predicated on delegation working properly, as it loads stub classes into newly-fabricated class loaders of type sun.reflect.DelegatingClassLoader, one stub class per loader, to allow unloading of the stub classes to occur more quickly. To handle this kind of bug, the JVM's internal class lookup mechanism must be slightly modified to check for instances of sun.reflect.DelegatingClassLoader as the incoming class loader and silently traverse the "parent" field once for such loaders before entering the bulk of the resolution code. This avoids an upcall to Java programming language code which certain loaders can not handle.

The following JVM entry points may be deleted:

• JVM_GetClassFields
• JVM_GetClassMethods
• JVM_GetClassConstructors
• JVM_GetClassField
• JVM_GetClassMethod
• JVM_GetClassConstructor
• JVM_NewInstance
• JVM_GetField
• JVM_GetPrimitiveField
• JVM_SetField
• JVM_SetPrimitiveField

To keep using the previous reflection implementation, licensees should not take changes from Sun's JDK 1.4 relating specifically to the implementation of reflection in the following classes/methods and any associated native code:

• java.lang.Class.newInstance0
• java.lang.Class.getClassLoader0
• java.lang.Class.getFields
• java.lang.Class.getMethods
• java.lang.Class.getDeclaredFields
• java.lang.Class.getDeclaredMethods
• java.lang.Class.getFields0
• java.lang.Class.getMethods0
• java.lang.Class.getConstructors0
• java.lang.Class.getField0
• java.lang.Class.getMethod0
• java.lang.Class.getConstructor0
• java.lang.ClassLoader.getCallerClassLoader
• java.lang.System.getCallerClass
• java.lang.reflect.AccessibleObject
• java.lang.reflect.Constructor
• java.lang.reflect.Field
• java.lang.reflect.Method
• java.lang.reflect.Modifier
• sun.misc.ClassReflector