Need help understanding why this breaks. PrintFoo can be called using either pointer or value. Why not NumField?
http://play.golang.org/p/Kw16ReujRx
type A struct {
foo string
}
func (a *A) PrintFoo(){
fmt.Println("Foo value is " + a.foo)
}
func main() {
a := &A{foo: "afoo"}
(*a).PrintFoo() //Works - no problem
a.PrintFoo() //Works - no problem
reflect.TypeOf(*a).NumField() //Works - no problem - Type = main.A
reflect.TypeOf(a).NumField() //BREAKS! - Type = *main.A
}
From the documentation :
// NumField returns the number of fields in the struct v.
// It panics if v's Kind is not Struct.
func (v Value) NumField() int
You are calling it on a pointer, you have to call it on a struct instead, for example :
fmt.Println(reflect.Indirect(reflect.ValueOf(a)).NumField())
fmt.Println(reflect.Indirect(reflect.ValueOf(*a)).NumField())
When you're not sure if your value is a pointer or not, use reflect.Indirect:
Indirect returns the value that v points to. If v is a nil pointer, Indirect returns a zero Value. If v is not a pointer, Indirect returns v.
//edit:
NumField gets called on Value, not your actual object, for example of you do:
func main() {
a := &A{foo: "afoo"}
fmt.Printf("%#v
", reflect.TypeOf(*a))
fmt.Printf("%#v
", reflect.TypeOf(a))
}
You will get :
//*a
&reflect.rtype{size:0x8, ...... ptrToThis:(*reflect.rtype)(0xec320)}
//a
&reflect.rtype{size:0x4, ...... ptrToThis:(*reflect.rtype)(nil)}
As you can tell, it's a completely different beast.
ptrToThis points to the actual struct.