\Header{Methods}{General Information on Methods}
\keyword{programming}{Methods}
\keyword{classes}{Methods}
\keyword{methods}{Methods}
\begin{Description}\relax
This documentation section covers some general topics on how methods
work and how the \pkg{methods} package interacts with the rest of R.  The
information is usually not needed to get started with methods and
classes, but may be helpful for moderately ambitious projects, or when
something doesn't work as expected.

The section \bold{How Methods Work} describes the underlying
mechanism; \bold{Class Inheritance and Method Selection} provides more
details on how class definitions determine which methods are used.

The section \bold{Changes with the Methods Package} outlines possible
effects on other computations when running with package \pkg{methods}.
\end{Description}
\begin{Section}{How Methods Work}
A generic function is a function that has associated with it a
collection of other functions (the methods), all of which agree in
formal arguments with the generic.  In R, the \dQuote{collection} is an
object of class \code{"\Link{MethodsList}"}, which contains a named
list of methods (the \code{methods} slot), and the name of one of the
formal arguments to the function (the \code{argument} slot).  The
names of the methods are the names of classes, and the corresponding
element defines the method or methods to be used if the corresponding
argument has that class.  For example, suppose a function \code{f} has
formal arguments \code{x} and \code{y}.  The methods list object for
that function has the object \code{as.name("x")} as its
\code{argument} slot.  An element of the methods named \code{"track"}
is selected if the actual argument corresponding to \code{x} is an
object of class \code{"track"}.  If there is such an element, it can
generally be either a function or another methods list object.

In the first case, the function defines the method to use for any call
in which \code{x} is of class \code{"track"}.  In the second case, the
new methods list object defines the selection of methods depending on
the remaining formal arguments, in this example, \code{y}.  The same
selection process takes place, recursively, using the new methods list.
Eventually, the selection returns either a function or \code{NULL},
meaning that no method matched the actual arguments.

Each method selected corresponds conceptually to a \emph{signature};
that is a named list of classes, with names corresponding to some or
all of the formal arguments.  In the previous example, if selecting
class \code{"track"} for \code{x}, finding that the selection was
another methods list and then selecting class \code{"numeric"} for
\code{y} would produce a method associated with the signature
\code{x = "track", y = "numeric"}.

The actual selection is done recursively, but you can see the methods
arranged by signature by calling the function
\code{\Link{showMethods}}, and objects with the methods arranged this
way (in two different forms) are returned by the functions
\code{\Link{listFromMlist}} and \code{\Link{linearizeMlist}}.

In an R session, each generic function has a single methods list
object defining all the currently available methods.  The session
methods list object is created the first time the function is called
by merging all the relevant method definitions currently visible.
Whenever something happens that might change the definitions (such as
attaching or detaching a package with methods for this function, or
explicitly defining or removing methods), the merged methods list
object is removed.  The next call to the function will recompute the
merged definitions.

When methods list are merged, they can come from two sources:
\Enumerate{
\item Methods list objects for the same function anywhere on the
current search list.  These are merged so that methods in an
environment earlier in the search list override methods for the same
function later in the search list.  A method overrides only 
another method for the same signature.  See the comments on class
\code{"ANY"} in the section on \bold{Inheritance}.
\item Methods list objects corresponding the group generic
functions, if any, for this function.  Any generic function can be
defined to belong to a group generic.  The methods for the group
generic are available as methods for this function.  The group
generic can itself be defined as belong to a group; as a result
there is a list of group generic functions.  A method defined for a
function and a particular signature overrides a method for the same
signature for that function's group generic.
}
Merging is done first on all methods for a particular function, and
then over the generic and its group generics.

The result is a single methods list object that contains all the
methods \emph{directly} defined for this function.  As calls to the
function occur, this information may be supplemented by
\emph{inherited} methods, which we consider next.
\end{Section}
\begin{Section}{Class Inheritance and Method Selection}
If no method is found directly for the actual arguments in a call to a
generic function, an attempt is made to match the available methods to
the arguments by using \emph{inheritance}.

Each class definition potentially includes the names of one or more
classes that the new class contains.  (These are sometimes called the
\emph{superclasses} of the new class.)  These classes themselves may
extend other classes.  Putting all this information together produces
the full list of superclasses for this class. (You can see this list
for any class \code{"A"} from the expression \code{extends("A")}.)
In addition, any class implicitly extends class \code{"ANY"}.
When all the superclasses are needed, as they are for dispatching
methods, they are ordered by how direct they are:  first, the direct
classes contained directly in the definition of this class, then the
superclasses of these classes, etc.

The S language has an additional, explicit mechanism for defining superclasses, the
\code{\Link{setIs}} mechanism.
This mechanism allows a class to extend another even though they do
not have the same representation.  The extension is made possible by
defining explicit methods to \code{coerce} an object to its superclass
and to \code{replace} the data in the object corresponding to the
superclass.  The \code{\Link{setIs}} mechanism will be used less often
and only when directly including the superclass does not make sense,
but once defined, the superclass acts just as directly contained
classes as far as method selection is concerned.

A method will be selected by inheritance if we can find a method in
the methods list for a signature corresponding to any
combination of superclasses for each of the relevant arguments.
The search for such a method is performed by the function
\code{\Link{MethodsListSelect}}, working as follows.


The generic, \code{f} say,  has a signature, which by default
is all its formal arguments, except \dots (see
\code{\Link{setGeneric}}). For each of the formal arguments in that
signature, in order, the class of the actual argument is matched
against available methods.  A missing argument corresponds to class
\code{"missing"}.  If no method corresponds to the class of the
argument, the evaluator looks for a method corresponding to the
the superclasses (the other classes that the actual class
extends, always including
\code{"ANY"}).  If no match is found, the dispatch fails, with an
error.  (But if there is a default method, that will always match.)

If the match succeeds, it can find either a single method, or a
methods list.  In the first case, the search is over, and returns
the method.  In the second case, the search proceeds, with the
next argument in the signature of the generic.  \emph{That} search
may succeed or fail.  If it fails, the dispatch will try again with
the next best match for the current argument, if there is one.
The last match always corresponds to class \code{"ANY"}.

The effect of this definition of the selection process is to order all
possible inherited methods, first by the superclasses for the first
argument, then within this by the superclasses for the second
argument, and so on.
\end{Section}
\begin{Section}{Changes with the Methods Package}
The \pkg{methods} package is designed to leave other computations in R
unchanged.  There are, however, a few areas where the default
functions and behavior are overridden when running with the methods
package attached.  This section outlines those known to have some
possible effect.

\describe{

\item[\code{class}:] The \pkg{methods} package enforces the notion that every object
has a class; in particular, \code{class(x)} is never \code{NULL},
as it would be for basic vectors, for example, when not using
\pkg{methods}. 

In addition, when assigning a class, the value is required to be a
single string.  (However, objects can have multiple class names if
these were generated by old-style class computations.  The methods
package does not hide the \dQuote{extra} class names.)

Computations using the notion of \code{NULL} class attributes or
of class attributes with multiple class names are not really
compatible with the ideas in the \pkg{methods} package.  Formal
classes and class inheritance are designed to give more flexible
and reliable implementations of similar ideas.

If you do have to mix the two approaches, any operations that use
class attributes in the old sense should be written in terms of
\code{attr(x, "class")}, not \code{class(x)}.  In particular, test
for no class having been assigned with
\code{is.null(attr(x, "class"))}.


\item[Printing:] To provide appropriate printing automatically for objects with
formal class definitions, the \pkg{methods} package overrides
\code{print.default}, to look for methods for the generic function
\code{show}, and to use a default method for objects with formal
class definitions.

The revised version of \code{print.default} is intended to produce
identical printing to the original version for any object that
does \emph{not} have a formally defined class, including honoring
old-style print methods.  So far, no exceptions are known.

}
\end{Section}
\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 and ongoing development, see the web page 
\url{http://developer.r-project.org/methodsPackage.html} and the
pointers from that page.
\end{References}
\begin{SeeAlso}\relax
\code{\Link{setGeneric}},
\code{\Link{setClass}}
\end{SeeAlso}

