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Obtaining and Using an Object of the Type Class

Obtaining and Using an Object of the Type Class

The java.lang package defines a class called Class. The Class class is different from the class (with a small ā€˜cā€™) keyword used to declare Java classes. The Class class is a Java class that describes other objects. Class does not have any constructors; thus it is not meant to be instantiated in a program. Its purpose in life is to allow a Java program to get information about other Java objects.

An object of type Class can be obtained by calling the getClass() method on a particular Java object. The method getClass() is defined in the Java Object class. You can obtain an object of the type Class for an object ā€œmyObjectā€ with the following line of code:

 Class myClass = myObject.getClass();

The Class class offers several useful methods that can give you information about the class of myObject, including:

 public Constructor[] getConstructors()  // returns class constructors public Method[] getMethods()            // returns class methodspublic Field[] getFields()              // returns class fields public Class getSuperClass()            // returns the superclass

The Class class provides the basis for Java Reflection and Introspection.

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