What is reflection api in Java

Question

what is the use of reflection api in java.. can anybody explains.. thanks

Answer 1

Reflection help you to analys the classes an the member of the classes created by the other programmers also
To know what are the member's(methods,constructers an other Declared fields etc) are present in it
But this also reduce's the security of the programs as other can Know about your code which is a security threat for programmer's

Example :

public class Reflection
{
public static void main()
{
try
{
Class cls = Class.forName("any_class_name");

Field [] f = cls.getDeclaredFields();
System.out.println(f[0]);

Method [] m = cls.getDeclaredMethods ();
System.out.println(m[0]);

Constructor [] c = cls.getDeclaredConstructors ();
System.out.println(c[0]);

}
catch (ClassNotFoundException e)
{
System.out.println(e);
}
}
}

this may help you :
http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/reflect/index.html