Methods and apparatus for type safe, lazy, user-defined class loading

摘要

Type safe linkage is ensured by establishing a constraint if a class references an attribute that is contained in another class. This constraint acts as a “promise” to later ensure type safe linkage. At some point later—such as at the earliest time that the type is loaded by both loaders—the constraint is verified. This may be accomplished by verifying that the type for the attribute is the same regardless of whether it is loaded by a loader that defines the referencing class or a loader that defines the referred class. If the constraint is not met, an error message is provided.