Software Architecture Design Patterns in Java

25 VIRTUAL PROXY

This pattern was previously described in GoF95.

DESCRIPTION

The Virtual Proxy pattern is a memory saving technique that recommends post-poning an object creation until it is needed: when creating such an object is expensive in terms of the memory usage or the processing involved. In a typical application, different objects make up different parts of the functionality. When an application is started, it may not need all of its objects to be available immediately. In such cases, the Virtual Proxy pattern suggests deferring object creation until it is needed by the application. The object is created the first time it is referenced in the application and the same instance is reused from that point onwards. This approach has advantages ...