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oopcircular-dependency
John Fitzpatrick
John Fitzpatrick

Reputation: 4349

Are circular dependencies considered bad design?

In my work (which is 90% Java but I'm sure this question applies to other languages) I often create two classes that "know about" each other. More concretely, class A imports B, and class B imports class A, and both have member or local variables of the other type.

Is this considered bad design? An anti-pattern if you will?

Upvotes: 10

Views: 4221

Answers (2)

TwTw
TwTw

Reputation: 547

Yes , It's bad design , It's contradicting the oop principles , It's seems you have to create a new class or interface will contain the the shared parameters and function for a and b , a and b imports this new class...

Upvotes: -1

NPE
NPE

Reputation: 500495

Here is my take:

  • If the two classes belong to the same logical module, then it's probably fine (still a judgement call of course, with lots of grey areas).
  • It's less fine if the two classes belong to different modules. This creates a circular dependency between modules. I try to avoid that as much as can, preferring a clear hierarchical structure.

Upvotes: 5

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