Relearning Java: What Principles Are Dynamic Proxies Based On?

Programming languages can be categorized from various perspectives, with dynamic typing and static typing being one such perspective. The basic distinction is whether type information is checked at runtime or at compile time.

A similar contrast is between strong typing and weak typing, which concerns whether type conversion needs to be explicitly enforced when assigning values to variables.

So, how does Java fit into this classification? Java is generally considered a statically typed, strongly typed language. However, because it provides mechanisms like reflection, it also possesses some capabilities of dynamically typed languages.

To the point, today’s question is about the reflection mechanism in Java and the principles behind dynamic proxies.

Typical answer

The reflection mechanism is a fundamental feature provided by Java that allows a program to introspect at runtime. Through reflection, we can directly manipulate classes or objects, such as retrieving the class definition of an object, accessing the attributes and methods declared by a class, invoking methods or constructing objects, and even modifying class definitions at runtime.