Understand the "Decorator Pattern" with a real world example

Example - Scenario- Let's say you are writing an encryption module. This encryption can encrypt the clear file using DES - Data encryption standard. Similarly, in a system you can have the encryption as AES - Advance encryption standard. Also, you can have the combination of encryption - First DES, then AES. Or you can have first AES, then DES.

Discussion- How will you cater this situation? You cannot keep creating the object of such combinations - for example - AES and DES - total of 4 combinations. Thus, you need to have 4 individual objects This will become complex as the encryption type will increase.

Solution - Keep building up the stack - combinations depending on the need - at run time. Another advantage of this stack approach is that you can unwind it easily.

Here is the solution - in C++.

Firstly, you need a base class - a fundamental unit of the stack. You can think as the base of the stack. In this example, it is clear file. Let's follow always polymorphism. Make first an interface class of this fundamental unit. This way,you can implement it as you wish. Also, you don't need to have think of dependency while including this fundamental unit.

Here is the interface class -

class IclearData
{
public:

    virtual std::string getData() = 0;
    virtual ~IclearData() = 0;
};

IclearData::~IclearData()
{
    std::cout<<"Destructor called of IclearData"<<std::endl;
}

Now, implement this interface class -

class clearData:public IclearData
{
private:

    std::string m_data;

    clearData();

    void setData(std::string data)
        {
            m_data = data;
        }

public:

    std::string getData()
    {
        return m_data;
    }

    clearData(std::string data)
    {
        setData(data);
    }

    ~clearData()
    {
        std::cout<<"Destructor of clear Data Invoked"<<std::endl;
    }

};

Now, let's make a decorator abstract class - that can be extended to create any kind of flavours - here the flavour is the encryption type. This decorator abstract class is related to the base class. Thus, the decorator "is a" kind of interface class. Thus, you need to use inheritance.

class encryptionDecorator: public IclearData
{

protected:
    IclearData *p_mclearData;

    encryptionDecorator()
    {
      std::cout<<"Encryption Decorator Abstract class called"<<std::endl;
    }

public:

    std::string getData()
    {
        return p_mclearData->getData();
    }

    encryptionDecorator(IclearData *clearData)
    {
        p_mclearData = clearData;
    }

    virtual std::string showDecryptedData() = 0;

    virtual ~encryptionDecorator() = 0;

};

encryptionDecorator::~encryptionDecorator()
{
    std::cout<<"Encryption Decorator Destructor called"<<std::endl;
}

Now, let's make a concrete decorator class - Encryption type - AES -

const std::string aesEncrypt = "AES Encrypted ";

class aes: public encryptionDecorator
{

private:

    std::string m_aesData;

    aes();

public:

    aes(IclearData *pClearData): m_aesData(aesEncrypt)
    {
        p_mclearData = pClearData;
        m_aesData.append(p_mclearData->getData());
    }

    std::string getData()
        {
            return m_aesData;
        }

    std::string showDecryptedData(void)
    {
        m_aesData.erase(0,m_aesData.length());
        return m_aesData;
    }

};

Now, let's say the decorator type is DES -

const std::string desEncrypt = "DES Encrypted ";

class des: public encryptionDecorator
{

private:

    std::string m_desData;

    des();

public:

    des(IclearData *pClearData): m_desData(desEncrypt)
    {
        p_mclearData = pClearData;
        m_desData.append(p_mclearData->getData());
    }

    std::string getData(void)
        {
            return m_desData;
        }

    std::string showDecryptedData(void)
    {
        m_desData.erase(0,desEncrypt.length());
        return m_desData;
    }

};

Let's make a client code to use this decorator class -

int main()
{
    IclearData *pData = new clearData("HELLO_CLEAR_DATA");

    std::cout<<pData->getData()<<std::endl;


    encryptionDecorator *pAesData = new aes(pData);

    std::cout<<pAesData->getData()<<std::endl;

    encryptionDecorator *pDesData = new des(pAesData);

    std::cout<<pDesData->getData()<<std::endl;

    /** unwind the decorator stack ***/
    std::cout<<pDesData->showDecryptedData()<<std::endl;

    delete pDesData;
    delete pAesData;
    delete pData;

    return 0;
}

You will see the following results -

HELLO_CLEAR_DATA
Encryption Decorator Abstract class called
AES Encrypted HELLO_CLEAR_DATA
Encryption Decorator Abstract class called
DES Encrypted AES Encrypted HELLO_CLEAR_DATA
AES Encrypted HELLO_CLEAR_DATA
Encryption Decorator Destructor called
Destructor called of IclearData
Encryption Decorator Destructor called
Destructor called of IclearData
Destructor of clear Data Invoked
Destructor called of IclearData

Here is the UML diagram - Class representation of it. In case, you want to skip the code and focus on the design aspect.

enter image description here

Decorator pattern achieves a single objective of dynamically adding responsibilities to any object.

Consider a case of a pizza shop. In the pizza shop they will sell few pizza varieties and they will also provide toppings in the menu. Now imagine a situation wherein if the pizza shop has to provide prices for each combination of pizza and topping. Even if there are four basic pizzas and 8 different toppings, the application would go crazy maintaining all these concrete combination of pizzas and toppings.

Here comes the decorator pattern.

As per the decorator pattern, you will implement toppings as decorators and pizzas will be decorated by those toppings' decorators. Practically each customer would want toppings of his desire and final bill-amount will be composed of the base pizzas and additionally ordered toppings. Each topping decorator would know about the pizzas that it is decorating and it's price. GetPrice() method of Topping object would return cumulative price of both pizza and the topping.

EDIT

Here's a code-example of explanation above.

public abstract class BasePizza
{
    protected double myPrice;

    public virtual double GetPrice()
    {
        return this.myPrice;
    }
}

public abstract class ToppingsDecorator : BasePizza
{
    protected BasePizza pizza;
    public ToppingsDecorator(BasePizza pizzaToDecorate)
    {
        this.pizza = pizzaToDecorate;
    }

    public override double GetPrice()
    {
        return (this.pizza.GetPrice() + this.myPrice);
    }
}

class Program
{
    [STAThread]
    static void Main()
    {
        //Client-code
        Margherita pizza = new Margherita();
        Console.WriteLine("Plain Margherita: " + pizza.GetPrice().ToString());

        ExtraCheeseTopping moreCheese = new ExtraCheeseTopping(pizza);
        ExtraCheeseTopping someMoreCheese = new ExtraCheeseTopping(moreCheese);
        Console.WriteLine("Plain Margherita with double extra cheese: " + someMoreCheese.GetPrice().ToString());

        MushroomTopping moreMushroom = new MushroomTopping(someMoreCheese);
        Console.WriteLine("Plain Margherita with double extra cheese with mushroom: " + moreMushroom.GetPrice().ToString());

        JalapenoTopping moreJalapeno = new JalapenoTopping(moreMushroom);
        Console.WriteLine("Plain Margherita with double extra cheese with mushroom with Jalapeno: " + moreJalapeno.GetPrice().ToString());

        Console.ReadLine();
    }
}

public class Margherita : BasePizza
{
    public Margherita()
    {
        this.myPrice = 6.99;
    }
}

public class Gourmet : BasePizza
{
    public Gourmet()
    {
        this.myPrice = 7.49;
    }
}

public class ExtraCheeseTopping : ToppingsDecorator
{
    public ExtraCheeseTopping(BasePizza pizzaToDecorate)
        : base(pizzaToDecorate)
    {
        this.myPrice = 0.99;
    }
}

public class MushroomTopping : ToppingsDecorator
{
    public MushroomTopping(BasePizza pizzaToDecorate)
        : base(pizzaToDecorate)
    {
        this.myPrice = 1.49;
    }
}

public class JalapenoTopping : ToppingsDecorator
{
    public JalapenoTopping(BasePizza pizzaToDecorate)
        : base(pizzaToDecorate)
    {
        this.myPrice = 1.49;
    }
}

It's worth noting that the Java i/o model is based on the decorator pattern. The layering of this reader on top of that reader on top of...is a really real world example of decorator.

This is a simple example of adding new behavior to an existing object dynamically, or the Decorator pattern. Due to the nature of dynamic languages such as Javascript, this pattern becomes part of the language itself.

// Person object that we will be decorating with logging capability
var person = {
  name: "Foo",
  city: "Bar"
};

// Function that serves as a decorator and dynamically adds the log method to a given object
function MakeLoggable(object) {
  object.log = function(property) {
    console.log(this[property]);
  }
}

// Person is given the dynamic responsibility here
MakeLoggable(person);

// Using the newly added functionality
person.log('name');

Understand the "Decorator Pattern" with a real world example

EDIT

Tags:

Design Patterns

Decorator

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