C#•2mo ago

How to refactor two classes that need visibility of each other?

I have two classes, InputManager and DisplayManager. In my current model, InputManager sometimes needs to write to the display, and DisplayManager needs to see the current state of input, so they have need of each other. At the moment I'm handling it like:

inputManager = new InputManager()
displayManager = new DisplayManager()

inputManager.Initialize(displayManager);
displayManager.Initialize(inputManager);

inputManager = new InputManager()
displayManager = new DisplayManager()

inputManager.Initialize(displayManager);
displayManager.Initialize(inputManager);

So both objects have a reference to each other and can call each's relevant public methods. The problem is of course that I get lots of "potentially null" warnings because I can't (seemingly) pass the displayManager via inputManager's constructor because it doesn't exist yet, and vice versa. I was wondering what the right approach is where I can guarantee non-null references but still have the two have access to each other?

3 Replies

sibber•2mo ago

either have the input manager handle all the display things or the display manager handle reading the input or a third class that kind of wires both hard to say without more details

Denis•2mo ago

If you only have one instance of each, you can: - make them singleton directly - use Dependency Injection and register these managers as singletons I recommend the second option.

sibber•2mo ago

that would still have a cyclic dependency no?

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How to refactor two classes that need visibility of each other?