Why not to use static methods - with example

Question

Hi Everyone,
I'd like to continue the below thread about "why not to use static methods"
Why not to use static methods
with a concrete example.
In my small application I need to be able to send keystrokes. (java.awt.Robot class is used for this)
I created the following class for these "operations" with static methods:
public class KeyboardInput {
     private static Robot r;
     static {
          try {
               r = new Robot();
          } catch (AWTException e) {
               throw new RuntimeException(e + "Robot couldn't be initialized.");
     public static void wait(int millis){
          r.delay(millis);
     public static void copy() {
          r.keyPress(KeyEvent.VK_CONTROL);
          r.keyPress(KeyEvent.VK_C);
          r.keyRelease(KeyEvent.VK_C);
          r.keyRelease(KeyEvent.VK_CONTROL);
     public static void altTab() {
          r.keyPress(KeyEvent.VK_ALT);
          r.keyPress(KeyEvent.VK_TAB);
          r.keyRelease(KeyEvent.VK_TAB);
          r.keyRelease(KeyEvent.VK_ALT);
               // more methods like  paste(), tab(), shiftTab(), rightArrow()
}Do you thinks it is a good solution? How could it be improved? I've seen something about Singleton vs. static methods somewhere. Would it be better to use Singleton?
Thanks for any comments in advance,
lemonboston

Answer 1

maheshguruswamy wrote:
lemonboston wrote:
maheshguruswamy wrote:
I think a singleton might be a better approach for you. Just kill the public constructor and provide a getInstance method to provide lazy initialization.Thanks maheshguruswamy for advising on the steps to create a singleton from this class.
Could you maybe advise also about why do you say that it would be better to use singleton? What's behind it? Thanks!In short, it seems to me that a single instance of your class will be able to coordinate actions across your entire application. So a singleton should be enough.But that doesn't answer why he should prefer a singleton instead over a bunch of static methods. Functionally the two are almost identical. In both cases there's only one "thing" on which to call methods--either a single instance of the class, or the class itself.
To answer the question, the main reason to use a Singleton over a classful of static methods is the same reason the drives a lot of non-static vs. static decisions: Polymorphism.
If you use a Singleton (and and interface), you can do something like this:
KeyboardInput kbi = get_some_instance_of_some_class_that_implements_KeyboardInput_somehow_maybe_from_a_factory();And then whatever is calling KBI's public methods only has to know that it has an implementor of that interface, without caring which concrete class it is, and you can substitute whatever implementation is appropriate in a given context. If you don't need to do that, then the static method approach is probably sufficient.
There are other reasons that may suggest a Singleton--serialization, persistence, use as a JavaBean pop to mind--but they're less common and less compelling in my experience.
And finally, if this thing maintains any state between method calls, although you can handle that with static member variables, it's more in keeping with the OO paradigm to make them non-static fields of an instance of that class.