Factory inside a web application. Design issue.

Question

Hi all,
My web application has a SearchManager. (which obviously doing search).
class SearchManager{
   SearchFactory factory = new MySearchFactory();  
   public SomeClass onSubmit(HttpRequest request, HttpResponse response, SomeCl obj){
        factory.search();
}I need a connection (instance of MyConnection) for doing the search which is kept in the session.
My question is: which is the best option from the following.
Option 1
Send the HttpSession into the SearchFactory and retrieve MYConnection instance from session, and perform the search.
factory.search(searchCriteria, session)
Option 2
Retrieve the MYConnection instance from session inside the SearchController and send the MyConnection to SearchFactory and perform the search.
MyConnection connection = session.getAttribute("connection");
factory.search(searchCriteria, connection);
One point to note:
SearchManager class does not require the MyConnectioin instance for any reason. But the Factory also does not need the session except to get the connection instance.
Could you guys please discuss this and show me which is good and why?
Thanks in advance.
Kamal

Answer 1

If the searchManager has a reference to connection wouldn't
it be an extra burden to have the searchManager in
the session rather than just having the connection
object?Extra burden on what?
If you store a reference to the SearchManager or if you store a refernce to the connection object, there is no difference?
I personally feel that it is better to store the SearchManager. You can personally feel different.
Now my question is: when we store an object in the
session, what get stored in the session actually?A reference to the object in the JVM gets stored.
Say above is my searchManager. If I store an instance
of this will it store the connection attribute also
inside the session? What actually get stored?When you store the reference to the SearchManager, the SearchManager has a reference to the connection object.
Only the reference to the SearchManager is stored in the sesssion.
and the connection reference is part of the SearchManager.
If you store the SearchManager reference in the session object, there is no need to explicity store a reference to the connection object becuase the SearchManager has this already.