How to set a specific return type to a method in Java

Question

So I have a class called Person

I can easily do something like

Person getPerson(){ return new Person(); }

But instead of using the 'Person' I want to declare my own class as a return type

Class<?> personClass = Class.forName("Person");
personClass getPerson() { return new Person(); }

Is this possible?

Answer 1

Your design is almost certainly wrong if you want to implement this, but yes, it's possible.

Object getThing(String className) throws Exception
{
    return Class.forName(className).getConstructor().newInstance();
}

You'll have to cast the result.

Answer 2

If you want Person class object (I mean, Class<Person> ), you can just use Person.class or personInstance.getClass() .

Also, if you want a custom method that will return it, then you can use:

public Class<Person> getPersonClass() {
    return Person.class;
}

But it is almost pointless, because you can just call Person.class . Beware, also, that Person.class is evaluated in compile time, and Class.forName("...") - in runtime.