Plugins using Parent (calling object or Class)'s Methods

Question

I would like to know if this design makes sense (or if im abusing the inheritance concept of java)
This comes about because :: Plugins, that are only known about at runtime, know of each others existance. But the core application does not know about plugins until runtime. The plugins might be reused so the core calling class may not be known till runtime either. So
Public Static Class PluginContainer {
Main() {
doSearchofDirectoryForUseablePlugins()
while pluginsLeft {
Load plugin so it can be referenced by name();
plugin[x].runmain()
SendMessage( String pluginName, Object message) {
doBlahToFindCorrectPlugin();
plugin[x].doSomethingWithMessage( Object message);
public Class plugin { // in a far off directory
public plugin() { //setup myself blah}
public runmain( ) { //do stuff
// ohh lets find out if my plugin friends are here
Class myParent = this.getSuperClass(); // does this give me my parent given that my parent is static??
myParent.sendMessage("Friend", aLittleSomethingiMadeEarlier);
Is this the correct way of doing this? Im new to this type of java programming. This comes late in the night - so i may be completely loopy over this apparent problem that seems so easy!
Thanks in Advance
Gary

Answer 1

1. You cannot declare a static top level class. Only nested classes (classes that are members of the surrounding class) can be declared static.
2. The Plugin class does not extend PluginContainer so PluginContainer is not the parent class, the Object class is.
What you probably want to do is declare a Plugin interface and have all you plugins implement that interface.