Whether private getter methods is Evil?

Question

Hi!
I was wondering whether it is bad or good to use private getter methods in a class rather than directly accessing private fields?
For instance, I have a getter method for each Swig component used in my program:
    private JButton run;
    private JButton getRun() {
         if (run != null) {
              return run;
        run = new JButton("Run");
        run.setToolTipText("Run");
        run.setIcon(new ImageIcon(ResourceHelper.getImageResource("run.png")));
        run.setEnabled(false);
        run.addActionListener(new ActionListener() {
            public void actionPerformed(ActionEvent event) {
                MessageDialog.showPleaseWait(TestRunnerUI.this,
                    "creating logger", new Runnable() {
                        public void run() {
// bla bla bla
        return run;
    }And so for each swing component....
But for example I have such a method:
    private void disconnect() {
        mRunner = null;
        mLogger = null;       
        log.log(Logger.INFO, "disconnected");
        tree.setModel(defaultModel);
        tree.setEnabled(true);
        save.setEnabled(false);
        saveAs.setEnabled(false);
        load.setEnabled(false);
        options.setEnabled(false);
        run.setEnabled(false);
        breakTests.setEnabled(false);
        connect.setEnabled(true);
        disconnect.setEnabled(false);
    }which changes properties of a lot of components...
I don't know whether I should use there private getter methods or not. From the design perspective it seems I should but it also adds some overhead I suppose...

Answer 1

I use accessor methods when writing persistent
classes and javabeans. The key is not to use them by
default, only when required. IMO this does not
violate encapsulation, it hides implementation. Agree. Inside the bean itself you shouldn't use it's accessors either.
The
main benefit being that should you need to refactor
the way a value is retrieved or set you have
localized the changes. Holub will tell you that if
you are using an accessor method to retrieve a value
from an object, in order to do some computation on
that value, you should move the computation into the
object's class instead (hence "getter and setter
methods are evil").Summarized, the public accessors are evil when the code behind does not only return/set the encapsulated value. Solution: refactor, split and rename them to "createSomething", "lookupSomething", "buildSomething", or so.
In this case the topicstarter was talking about private getters tho.