Software Engineering

Structural Design Patterns

Software Engineering 2012

Department of Computer Science Ben-Gurion university

Based on slides of: Mira Balaban Department of Computer Science Ben-Gurion university
F. Tip. IBM T J Watson Research Center.
 Structural Patterns
 concerned with how classes and objects are composed to form
larger structures
 structural class patterns: use inheritance to compose interfaces or
implementations.
 structural object patterns: describe ways to compose objects to realize new
functionality.
 structural patterns:

 Adapter  Façade
 Composite  Bridge
 Proxy  Decorator
 Flyweight

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 2

 Adapter – Motivation
 Build a drawing editor for manipulation of graphical objects like
lines, polygons, text.
 A graphical object has an editable shape.
 A graphical object can draw itself.
 Key abstraction: an abstract class Shape.
 Implementation subclasses: A subclass of Shape for each kind of
graphical object – Lineshape, PolygonShape,TextShape.
 TextShape implementation is difficult, but there are many off-the-
shelf tools for that, e.g., TextView.
 Problem:
interface of existing tools is different from Shape.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 3

 Adapter – Solution
 Bad solution: change the TextView class so to conform to the
Shape :
 TextView’s source code is not available.
 Does not make sense to change TextView to adopt domain-specific interfaces.
 Good solutions: TextShape adapts the TextView interface to
Shape's.
 Inherit Shape's interface and TextView's implementation.
or
 Compose TextShape a TextView instance within a TextShape and implement in
terms of TextView's interface.
 Two approaches: Class and object versions of the Adapter
pattern.
 TextShape is an adapter.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 4

 Adapter – Solution (the object version)
 TextShape adapts TextView to Shape:
 Reuses TextView’s implementation for computing a bounding box.
 Adds a new functionality: CreateManipulator.

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 Adapter: Participants
 Target
 defines the interface that you need to implement
 Client
 collaborates with objects conforming to the Target interface
 Adaptee
 defines an existing interface that needs adapting
 Adapter
 adapts the interface of Adaptee to the Target interface

Adapter - a.k.a Wrapper

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 Class Adapter: Class Diagram

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 Object Adapter: Class Diagram

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 Adapter: intent and context
 converts the interface of a class into another interface
that clients expect
 two variations:
 Class Adapter: uses multiple inheritance
 Object Adapter: relies on object composition
 use Adapter when:
 you want to use an existing class, and its interface does not
match the one you need
 (object adapter) you need to use several existing subclasses, but
it’s impractical to adapt their interface by subclassing every one.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 9

 Adapter: Example
 Suppose we have a Client application that uses a Stack,
with operations push(), pop(), nrElements() .
 Instead of implementing Stack from scratch, we want to
use an existing Vector class that provides almost the right
functionality.
 Solution: Create a StackAdapter class
 (class adapter) extends Vector, implements Stack interface.
 (object adapter) has pointer to a Vector, implements Stack
interface.

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 Client and Target Classes
public class Client {
public static void main(String[] args) {
Stack s = new StackAdapter();
s.push("foo");
s.push("bar");
s.push("baz");
System.out.println(s.pop());
System.out.println(s.pop());
System.out.println(s.pop());
}
}

interface Stack {
public void push(Object o);
public Object pop();
public int nrElements();
}

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 Class StackAdapter (class adapter)
class StackAdapter extends Vector implements Stack {
StackAdapter(){
super();
}
public void push(Object o){
insertElementAt(o, size());
}
public Object pop(){
Object o = elementAt(size()-1);
removeElementAt(size()-1);
return o;
}
public int nrElements(){
return size();
}
}
Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 12
 Class StackAdapter (object adapter)
class StackAdapter implements Stack {
StackAdapter(){ _adaptee = new Vector(); }
public void push(Object o){
_adaptee.insertElementAt(o,
_adaptee.size());
}
public Object pop(){
Object o =
_adaptee.elementAt(_adaptee.size()-1);
_adaptee.removeElementAt(_adaptee.size()-
1);
return o;
}
public int nrElements(){
return _adaptee.size();
}
private Vector _adaptee;
} Engineering, 2012
Software Design Patterns – Structural patterns 13
 Adapter: Tradeoffs
 class adapters:
 adapts Adaptee to Target by committing to a specific Adapter class;
will not work when we want to adapt a class and its subclasses
 lets Adapter override/reuse some of Adaptee’s behavior
 introduces only one object, no additional pointer indirection is
needed to get to Adaptee
 object adapters:
 lets a single Adapter work with many Adaptees – a single adapter
for a whole adaptees hierarchy.
 makes it harder to override Adaptee behavior (requires
subclassing of Adaptee, and making Adapter refer to the subclass)

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 14

 Bridge: Motivation
 Implementation of a portable Window abstraction in a user
interface toolkit.
 several possible platforms: XWindow System, IBM's Presentation
Manager (PM), …
 Different kinds of windows: IconWindow,TransientWindow,…
 Need to extend Window with hierarchies in multiple
―dimensions‖.

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 Bridge: Motivation
Regular solution -- Subclassing:

Problems:
 a combinatorial explosion in number of classes
 difficulties in sharing of implementations
 exposure of platform dependencies to clients

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 Bridge: Solution

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 Bridge: Participants
 Abstraction
 defines the abstraction’s interface
 maintains a reference to an object of type Implementor
 RefinedAbstraction
 extends the interface defined by Abstraction
 Implementor
 defines the interface for the implementation classes; doesn’t
have to match interface of Abstraction
 ConcreteImplementor
 implements the Implementor interface and defines its concrete
implementation

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 Bridge: Class Diagram

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 Bridge: intent and context
 decouple an abstraction from its implementation so that
the two can vary independently
 use Bridge when:
 you want to avoid a permanent binding between an abstraction
and its implementation
 both the abstractions and implementations need to be
subclassed
 changes in the implementation should have no impact on clients
(no recompilation). Implementation is hidden from clients.
 you want to avoid a proliferation of classes caused by extension
in multiple, orthogonal extensions
 you want to share an implementation among multiple objects,
and hide this fact from the client

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 Bridge: Example
Stack that lets us select one of several
different implementations:
 linked list Stack
 array-based Stack

1 2 3 2

tail
3

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 Abstraction -- Class Stack
class Stack {
Stack(String implType){
if (implType.equals("array")){
_impl = new ArrayBasedStack();
} else if (implType.equals("linkedlist")){
_impl = new LinkedListBasedStack();
}
}
public void push(Object o){ _impl.push(o); }
public Object pop(){ return _impl.pop(); }
public boolean isEmpty(){ return_impl.isEmpty(); }
public boolean isFull(){ return _impl.isFull(); }

private StackImpl _impl;

}

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 Implementation -Class StackImpl
interface StackImpl {
public void push(Object o);
public Object pop();
public boolean isEmpty();
public boolean isFull();
}

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 Class ArrayBasedStack
class ArrayBasedStack implements StackImpl {
public void push(Object o){
if ( !isFull()){ _elements[++_size] = o; }
}
public boolean isEmpty(){ return (_size == -1); }
public boolean isFull(){
return (_size == MAX_SIZE-1);
}
public Object pop(){
if (isEmpty()){ return null; }
return _elements[_size--];
}
private final int MAX_SIZE = 100;
private Object[] _elements = new Object[MAX_SIZE];
private int _size = -1;
}

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 Class LinkedListBasedStack (1)
class LinkedListBasedStack implements StackImpl {

// use an inner class for linked list nodes

private class Node {
Node(Object o){
value = o;
next = null;
prev = null;
}
public Object value;
public Node next;
public Node prev;
}

public boolean isEmpty(){ return _tail == null;}

public boolean isFull(){ return false; }

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 Class LinkedListBasedStack (2)
public void push(Object o){
if (_tail == null){
_tail = new Node(o);
} else {
_tail.next = new Node(o);
_tail.next.prev = _tail;
_tail = _tail.next;
}
}
public Object pop(){
if (isEmpty()) return null;
Object ret = _tail.value;
_tail = _tail.prev;
return ret;
}
private Node _tail;
}
Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 26
 Client Class
public class Main {

public static void main(String[] args) {

Stack s = new Stack("linkedlist");
s.push("foo");
s.push("bar");
s.push("baz");
s.push("zip");
s.push("zap");
while (!s.isEmpty()){
System.out.println(s.pop());
}

}
}

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 27

 Detail the abstraction
Stack
+push
+pop <<StackImpl >>
+isEmpty
+isFull

LinkedListBasedStack ArrayBasedStack
Stack With Swapping
…
+swap

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 28

 Bridge vs. Adapter
 Object Adapter and Bridge lead to code that looks quite similar.
However, they serve different purposes:
 Adapter is retrofitted to make existing unrelated classes work
together.
 Bridge is designed up-front to let the abstraction and the
implementation vary independently.

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 Bridge: Implementation
 Only one Implementor – Abstraction-Implementor separation is still
useful when a change in the implementation must not affect
existing clients
 Creating the right implementation object: How, when, where to
decide on concrete implementation object?
 Abstraction knows about all concrete implementation classes:
 Parameterized constructor.
 Default implementor.
 An Abstract Factory object is handled to the Abstraction
constructor – abstraction is decoupled from all implementor
classes.

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 Composite: Motivation
 Graphics applications build complex diagrams out of
simple components.
 Components can be repeatedly grouped to form larger
components.
 There are graphics primitives: Text, Lines, …
 Containers for primitives: Picture.
 Clients treat primitive and container objects indifferently
-- Distinguishing these objects makes client applications
more complex.

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 Composite: Solution
 Insert an abstract class that represents both primitives and
their containers.

 Picture objects can compose other Pictures recursively.

 Composite structure can be a tree or a graph.

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 Composite: Solution

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 Composite: Participants
 Component
 declares common interface
 implements default behavior common interface
 declares interface for accessing/managing child components and (optional) for
accessing parent
 Leaf
 represents leaf objects in the composition
 defines behavior for primitive objects
 Composite
 defines behavior for components having children
 stores child components
 implements child-related operations in Component
 Client
 manipulates objects via the Component interface

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 Composite: Class Diagram

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 Composite: Intent and context
 Compose objects into tree (directed graph) structures to
represent part-whole hierarchies.
 Composite lets you treat individual objects and
compositions of objects uniformly.
 Apply Composite when:
 you want to model part-whole hierarchies of objects
 you want clients to be able to ignore the difference between
compositions of objects and individual objects.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 36

 Composite Example: Unix file systems
 Participants: a Node (Component) is a File (Leaf) or a
Directory (Composite).

leaf
Composite
leaf

Composite leaf

Composite leaf
Composite
leaf leaf

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 37

 Composite Example: Unix file systems
 Operations: the find command can be used to find and
print files with a particular name
 uses auxiliary operation getAbsoluteName().
 usage: find <directory> -name <pattern>
 find . -name “*.java” finds all Java source files in the
current directory and its subdirectories and prints their
absolute name.
 The example is a somewhat simplified version: we will study a
method Node.find(s) that finds all the files whose name contains s
as a substring.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 38

 class Node
abstract class Node {
Node(String n, Directory p){
_name = n; _parent = p;
if (_parent != null){ p.add(this); }
}
public String getName(){ return _name; }
public String getAbsoluteName(){
if (_parent != null){
return _parent.getAbsoluteName() + getName();
}
return getName();
}
public abstract Vector find(String s);
protected String _name;
protected Directory _parent;
}

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 39

 class File
class File extends Node {
private String _contents;

File(String n, Directory p, String c){

super(n,p); _contents = c;
}
public Vector find(String s){
Vector result = new Vector();
if (getName().indexOf(s) != -1){
// s is found
result.add(getAbsoluteName());
}
return result;
}
}

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 40

 class Directory (1)
class Directory extends Node {
private Vector _children;
Directory(String n){ this(n, null); }
Directory(String n, Directory p){
super(n,p);
_children = new Vector();
}
public String getAbsoluteName(){
return super.getAbsoluteName() + "/";
}
public void add(Node n){
_children.addElement(n);
}
...

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 41

 class Directory (2)
...
public Vector find(String s){
Vector result = new Vector();
if (getName().indexOf(s) != -1){
result.add(getAbsoluteName());
}
for (int t=0; t < _children.size(); t++){
Node child = (Node)_children.elementAt(t);
result.addAll(child.find(s));
}
return result;
}
}

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 42

 class Main
public class Main {
public static void main(String[] args){
Directory root = new Directory("");
File core = new File("core", root, "hello");
Directory usr = new Directory("usr", root);
File adm = new File("adm", usr, "there");
Directory foo = new Directory("foo", usr);
File bar1 = new File("bar1", usr, "abcdef");
File bar2 = new File("xbar2", usr, "abcdef");
File bar3 = new File("yybarzz3", usr,
"abcdef");
System.out.println(root.find("bar"));
}
}

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 43

 output
[/usr/bar1,/usr/xbar2,/usr/yybarzz3]

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 44

 Composite: Considerations
 composite makes clients more uniform
 composite makes it easy to add new kinds of components
Disadvantages:
 Some operations only make sense for Leaf or Composite
classes, but not for both.
 Cannot restrict a component to have only components of
a certain type. Cannot rely on the type system for that.
 Need run time checks instead.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 45

 Composite: Implementation
 Explicit parent reference in Component.
 Invariant: inverse child-parent references.
 Maximize Component interface – adds transparency.
 Child management operations:
 Best maintained in addition/removal operations of Component.
 Implies a uniform view of Composite and Leaf: A Leaf is a Composite with an empty
children collection.
 Transparency-safety tradeoff:
 In Component: increased transparency, less safety.
 In Composite: Less transparency, increased safety.
 Sharing components -- for correctness ( structure is a directed graph) or
efficiency (  Flyweight).
 Storage management issues.
 Child ordering relevant or not (  Iterator).
 Caching traversal/search information for efficiency.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 46

 Proxy: Motivation
 A document editor that can embed graphical objects in a
document.
 Some graphical objects are expensive to create.
 Not all of these objects are visible at the same time.
 Opening a document should be fast.

Avoid creating all the expensive objects at once.

Create each expensive object on demand.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 47

 Proxy: Solution (1)
 Use another object, an image proxy, that acts as a stand-in
for the real image.
 The image proxy creates the real image only when the
document editor asks it to display itself by invoking its Draw
operation.
 The image proxy might store information about the real
image.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 48

 Proxy: Solution (2)
 The Document Editor should be unaware of the proxy:

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 49

 Proxy: Participants
 Proxy
 Maintains reference that lets proxy access real subject.
 Provides an interface identical to the subject’s.
 Controls access to the real subject, and may be responsible for
creating & deleting it.
 Other responsibilities depend on the kind of proxy:
 remote proxies: encoding and transferring request. A local representative.
 virtual proxies: caching information (like ImageProxy)
 protection proxies: check access permissions
 Subject
 Defines the common interface for RealSubject and Proxy so that Proxy
can be used anywhere RealSubject is used.
 RealSubject
 Defines the real object represented by the Proxy.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 50

 Proxy: Class Diagram

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 51

 Proxy: Object diagram
 A possible object diagram at run time:

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 52

 Proxy: Intent and context
 Proxy provides a surrogate or placeholder for another
object to control access to it
 Apply Proxy when:
 you need a local representative for an object that lives in a
different address space (remote proxy).
 you want to avoid the creation of expensive objects until they
are really needed (virtual proxy).
 you want to control access to an object (protection proxy).
 you need a smart pointer that performs additional actions when
an object is accessed (e.g., reference-counting, loading
persistent objects into memory).

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 53

 Proxy Example: Symbolic Links
 in Unix, you can create symbolic links to files and
directories with the ―ln‖ command.
 syntax: ln –s <directory> <linkName>
 after this command, you can access the directory also via
the link.
 you can tell the find command to follow symbolic links
by specifying the –follow option.
 we will now extend the File System example with
symbolic links, implemented using Proxy.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 54

 class Link (1)
class Link extends Node {

private Node _realNode;

Link(String n, Node w, Directory p){

super(n,p); _realNode = w;
}
public String getAbsoluteName(){
return super.getAbsoluteName() + "@";
}

...

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 55

 class Link (2)
public Vector find(String s){
Vector result = new Vector();
if (getName().indexOf(s) != -1){
result.add(getAbsoluteName());
}
Vector resultsViaLink = _realNode.find(s);
String realNodePath = _realNode.getAbsoluteName();
int n = realNodePath.length();
for (int t=0; t < resultsViaLink.size(); t++){
String r = (String)resultsViaLink.elementAt(t);
String rr = super.getAbsoluteName() + "/" +
r.substring(n);
result.add(rr);
}
return result;
}

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 56

 class Main
public class Main {
public static void main(String[] args){
Directory root = new Directory("");
File core = new File("core", root, "hello");
Directory usr = new Directory("usr", root);
File adm = new File("adm", usr, "there");
Directory foo = new Directory("foo", usr);
File bar1 = new File("bar1", foo, "abcdef");
File bar2 = new File("xbar2", foo, "abcdef");
File bar3 = new File("yybarzz3", foo, "abcdef");
Link link = new Link("link-to-usr", usr, root);
Link linkToLink =
new Link("link-to-link", link, root);
System.out.println(root.find("bar"));
}
}

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 57

 output
[/usr/foo/bar1,
/usr/foo/xbar2,
/usr/foo/yybarzz3,
/link-to-usr/foo/bar1,
/link-to-usr/foo/xbar2,
/link-to-usr/foo/yybarzz3,
/link-to-link/foo/bar1,
/link-to-link/foo/xbar2,
/link-to-link/foo/yybarzz3]

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 58

 Proxy vs. Adapter
 An Adapter provides a different interface to the object it
adapts.

 In contrast, a Proxy provides the same interface as its

subject.

 However, a Proxy used for access protection might refuse

to perform an operation that the subject will perform, so
its interface may be effectively a subset of the subject's.

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 Other structural patterns
 Decorator
 Attach additional responsibilities to an object dynamically.
 Basically a ―wrapper‖ around an object with the same interface
as the object.
 Facade
 Provide a unified interface to a set of interfaces in a subsystem.
 Flyweight
 Use sharing to support large numbers of fine-grained objects
efficiently.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 60

 Decorator: Motivation
 A graphical user interface toolkit: enable addition of
properties like borders or behaviors like scrolling to any
user interface component.
 Bad solution: inheritance (e.g., a border) from another
class. Inflexible!
 Decorator solution: Enclose the component in another
object – the Decorator -- that adds the border.
 Transparency:The decorator conforms to the interface of the
component it decorates.
 The decorator forwards requests to the component and may
perform additional actions.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 61

 Decorator: Solution
 A TextView object that displays text in a window.
 Composing decorators: compose a TextView object with
BorderDecorator and ScrollDecorator objects to produce a
bordered, scrollable text view:

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 Decorator: Solution

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 63

 Decorator Example
package decorator;
public interface VisualComponent {
public void draw ();
public void resize();
}

public class TextView implements VisualComponent{

@Override
public void draw() { // implementation of draw}
public void resize() { // implementation of resize}
}

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 Decorator Example
package decorator;
public class Decorator implements VisualComponent {
/** * private reference to the VisualComponent being decorated
private VisualComponent privateVisualComponentRefernce = null;
public Decorator ( VisualComponent VisualComponentRefernce) {
this.privateVisualComponentRefernce = VisualComponentRefernce;
}
@Override
public void draw() {
privateVisualComponentRefernce.draw ();
}
public void resize() {
privateVisualComponentRefernce.resize ();
}

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 65

 Decorator Example
// Concrete Decorator with extended state
public class ScrollDecorator extends Decorator {
// Additional State
private Object scrollBarObjectRepresentation = null;
public ScrollDecorator (VisualComponent VisualComponentRefernce) {
super(VisualComponent Refernce);
}
@Override
public void draw() {
private void drawScrollBarObject() {
// draw scroll bar // prepare scroll bar
drawScrollBarObject(); scrollBarObjectRepresentation = new Object();
// drawscrollbar
//draw decorated VisualComponent
}
super.draw ();
}
…
}
Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 66
 Decorator Example
public class GUIDriver {
public static void main(String[] args) {
// create a new VisualComponent
VisualComponent vComponent = new TextView ();
vComponent .draw();

// at some point later - maybe text size becomes larger than the VisualComponent
thus the scrolling behavior must be added
// decorate the exiting VisualComponent
vComponent = new ScrollDecorator (vComponent );
// now VisualComponent object has additional behavior / state
vComponent .draw();
}
}

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 Decorator: Participants
 Component (VisualComponent)
defines the interface for objects that can have responsibilities
added to them dynamically.
 ConcreteComponent (TextView)
defines an object to which additional responsibilities can be
attached.
 Decorator
maintains a reference to a Component object and defines an
interface that conforms to Component's interface.
 ConcreteDecorator (BorderDecorator,ScrollDecorator)
adds responsibilities to the component.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 68

 Decorator: Class diagram

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 69

 Decorator: Intent and context
 Decorator forwards requests to its Component object. May
perform additional operations before and after.

 Apply Decorator when:

 you need to add responsibilities to individual objects
dynamically and transparently, without affecting other objects.
 extension by subclassing is impractical.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 70

 Decorator: Considerations
 Responsibilities can be added and removed at run-time
by attaching and detaching them.

 Functionality is composed from simple pieces.

Functionality is added incrementally with Decorator
objects.

 A Decorator and its Component aren't identical.

 Lots of little objects: Easy to customize, hard to learn

and debug.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 71

 Decorator: Implementation
 A Decorator's interface must conform to the interface of
the Component it decorates.

 The abstract Decorator class can be omitted in case of a

single added responsibility.

 Component class should be kept lightweight – little data,

little functionality (otherwise, use Strategy).

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 72

 Decorator vs. other structural patterns
 Adapter:
A Decorator only changes an object's responsibilities, not its interface; an
Adapter gives an object a completely new interface.
 Composite:
A Decorator can be viewed as a degenerate Composite with only one
Component. A Decorator adds additional responsibilities — it is not
intended for object aggregation.
 Proxy:
Implementation is similar, but Decorator has a different purpose. A
Decorator adds responsibilities to an object, whereas a Proxy controls
access to an object.
Implementation similarity:
 A protection Proxy might be implemented exactly like a decorator.
 A remote Proxy contains an indirect reference to its real subject.
 A virtual Proxy starts with an indirect reference but eventually obtains a direct
reference.

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 Facade: Motivation
 Structuring a system into subsystems helps reduce complexity.
 A common design goal is to minimize the communication and dependencies between
subsystems.

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 Intent and Context
 Intent
Provide a unified interface to a set of interfaces in a subsystem. Facade defines a
higher-level interface that makes the subsystem easier to use.

 Use the Facade pattern when

 you want to provide a simple interface to a complex subsystem
 there are many dependencies between clients and the implementation
classes of an abstraction.
 you want to layer your subsystems.
Use a facade to define an entry point to each
subsystem level.
If subsystems are dependent -simplify the by making
them communicate with each other solely through
their facades.

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 Façade Example

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 Facade: participants
 Facade (Compiler)
 knows which subsystem classes are responsible for a request.
 delegates client requests to appropriate subsystem objects.

 subsystem classes (Scanner, Parser)

 implement subsystem functionality.
 handle work assigned by the Facade object.
 have no knowledge of the facade; that is, they keep no
references to it.

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 Facade: Class diagram

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 78

 Flyweight: Motivation
 Document editor: Characters are objects that occur
plenty of times.
 Efficiency Problem: Too many character occurrences.

 Solution: Flyweight objects: Shared objects that can be

used in multiple contexts simultaneously.
 Intrinsic state is stored in the flyweight;
 Extrinsic state varies with the flyweight's.
Client objects pass extrinsic state to the flyweight
when it needs it.

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 Flyweight: Solution
 Flyweight operations that may depend on extrinsic state
have it passed to them as a parameter.

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 80

 Flyweight example

Software Engineering, 2012 Design Patterns – Structural patterns 81

 Flyweight: Participants
 Flyweight
 declares an interface through which flyweights can receive and act on
extrinsic state.
 ConcreteFlyweight (Character)
 implements the Flyweight interface and adds storage for intrinsic state, if any.
 UnsharedConcreteFlyweight (Row, Column)
 not all Flyweight subclasses need to be shared. A UnsharedConcreteFlyweight
objects can have ConcreteFlyweight objects as children.
 FlyweightFactory
 creates and manages flyweight objects.
 ensures that flyweights are shared properly.
 Client
 maintains a reference to flyweight(s).
 computes or stores the extrinsic state of flyweight(s).

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 Flyweight: Class diagram

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 Flyweight: Object diagram

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 Flyweight: intent and context
 Use sharing to support large numbers of fine-grained
objects efficiently.
 Apply Flyweight when all of the following are true:
 An application uses a large number of objects.
 Storage costs are high because of the sheer quantity of objects.
 Most object state can be made extrinsic.
 Many groups of objects may be replaced by relatively few shared
objects once extrinsic state is removed.
 The application doesn't depend on object identity. Since
flyweight objects may be shared, identity tests will return true
for conceptually distinct objects.

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 Flyweight: Considerations
 Clients must obtain ConcreteFlyweight objects exclusively
from the FlyweightFactory object to ensure they are shared
properly.

 Time/space tradeoffs.

 The Flyweight pattern is often combined with the

Composite pattern to represent a hierarchical structure as
a graph with shared leaf nodes.

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