\HeaderA{callNextMethod}{Call an Inherited Method}{callNextMethod}
\keyword{programming}{callNextMethod}
\keyword{classes}{callNextMethod}
\keyword{methods}{callNextMethod}
\begin{Description}\relax
A call to \code{callNextMethod} can only appear inside a method
definition.  It then results in a call to the first inherited method
after the current method, with the arguments to the current method
passed down to the next method.  The value of that method call is the
value of \code{callNextMethod}.
\end{Description}
\begin{Usage}
\begin{verbatim}
callNextMethod(...)
\end{verbatim}
\end{Usage}
\begin{Arguments}
\begin{ldescription}
\item[\code{...}] Optionally, the arguments to the function in its next call
(but note that the dispatch is as in the detailed description below;
the arguments have no effect on selecting the next method.) 

If no arguments are included in the call to \code{callNextMethod}, the
effect is to call the method with the current arguments.
See the detailed description for what this really means.

Calling with no arguments is often the natural way to use
\code{callNextMethod}; see the examples.

\end{ldescription}
\end{Arguments}
\begin{Details}\relax
The \sQuote{next} method (i.e., the first inherited method) is defined
to be that method which \emph{would} have been called if the current
method did not exist. This is more-or-less literally what happens: The
current method (to be precise, the method with signature given by the
\code{defined} slot of the method from which \code{callNextMethod} is
called) is deleted from a copy of the methods for the current generic,
and \code{\LinkA{selectMethod}{selectMethod}} is called to find the next method (the
result is cached in a special object, so the search only typically
happens once per session per combination of argument classes).

Note that the preceding definition means that the next method is
defined uniquely when \code{setMethod} inserts the method containing
the \code{callNextMethod} call, given the definitions of the classes
in the signature. The choice does not depend on the path that gets us
to that method (for example, through inheritance or from another
\code{callNextMethod} call). This definition was not enforced in
versions of \R{} prior to 2.3.0, where the method was selected based on
the target signature, and so could vary depending on the actual
arguments.

It is also legal, and often useful, for the method called by
\code{callNextMethod} to itself have a call to
\code{callNextMethod}. This generally works as you would expect, but
for completeness be aware that it is possible to have ambiguous
inheritance in the S structure, in the sense that the same two
classes can appear as superclasses \emph{in the opposite order} in
two other class definitions.  In this case the effect of a nested
instance of \code{callNextMethod} is not well defined.  Such
inconsistent class hierarchies are both rare and nearly always the
result of bad design, but they are possible, and currently undetected.

The statement that the method is called with the current arguments is
more precisely as follows.  Arguments that were missing in the current
call are still missing (remember that \code{"missing"} is a valid
class in a method signature).  For a formal argument, say \code{x}, that
appears in the original call, there is a corresponding argument in the
next method call equivalent to \code{x = x}.  In effect, this
means that the next method sees the same actual arguments, but
arguments are evaluated only once.
\end{Details}
\begin{Value}
The value returned by the selected method.
\end{Value}
\begin{References}\relax
The R package \pkg{methods} implements, with a few exceptions, the
programming interface for classes
and methods in the book \emph{Programming with Data} (John
M. Chambers, Springer, 1998), in particular sections 1.6, 2.7, 2.8,
and chapters 7 and 8.

While the programming interface for the \pkg{methods} package follows
the reference, the R software is an original implementation, so
details in the reference that reflect the S4 implementation may appear
differently in R.  Also, there are extensions to the programming 
interface developed more recently than the reference.  For a
discussion of details see \code{?\LinkA{Methods}{Methods}}
and the links from that documentation.
\end{References}
\begin{SeeAlso}\relax
\LinkA{Methods}{Methods} for the general behavior of method dispatch
\end{SeeAlso}
\begin{Examples}
\begin{ExampleCode}

## some class definitions with simple inheritance
setClass("B0" , representation(b0 = "numeric"))

setClass("B1", representation(b1 = "character"), contains = "B0")

setClass("B2", representation(b2 = "logical"), contains = "B1")

## and a rather silly function to illustrate callNextMethod

f <- function(x) class(x)

setMethod("f", "B0", function(x) c(x@b0^2, callNextMethod()))
setMethod("f", "B1", function(x) c(paste(x@b1,":"), callNextMethod()))
setMethod("f", "B2", function(x) c(x@b2, callNextMethod()))

b1 <- new("B1", b0 = 2, b1 = "Testing")

b2 <- new("B2", b2 = FALSE, b1 = "More testing", b0 = 10)

f(b2)

f(b1)



\end{ExampleCode}
\end{Examples}

