Circular dependency
This article will address the topic of Circular dependency, which has generated great interest and debate in different areas. With the aim of thoroughly understanding this topic, different perspectives and approaches will be explored that will shed light on its importance and impact today. Through a detailed and exhaustive analysis, the aim is to provide the reader with a comprehensive and complete vision of Circular dependency, providing relevant and updated information that contributes to enriching the knowledge and understanding of this matter. From its origins to its impact on today's society, the aim is to offer a global vision that allows us to delve deeper into the most relevant aspects of Circular dependency, providing a clear and detailed overview that serves as a starting point for future research and reflections.
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In software engineering, a circular dependency (or cyclic dependency) is a relation between two or more modules which either directly or indirectly depend on each other to function properly. Such modules are also known as mutually recursive.
Overview
Circular dependencies are natural in many domain models where certain objects of the same domain depend on each other.[1] However, in software design, circular dependencies between larger software modules are considered an anti-pattern because of their negative effects.[1] Despite this, such circular (or cyclic) dependencies have been found to be widespread among the source files of real-world software.[2] Mutually recursive modules are, however, somewhat common in functional programming, where inductive and recursive definitions are often encouraged.
Problems
Circular dependencies can cause many unwanted effects in software programs. Most problematic from a software design point of view is the tight coupling of the mutually dependent modules which reduces or makes impossible the separate re-use of a single module.
Circular dependencies can cause a domino effect when a small local change in one module spreads into other modules and has unwanted global effects (program errors, compile errors). Circular dependencies can also result in infinite recursions or other unexpected failures.
Circular dependencies may also cause memory leaks by preventing certain automatic garbage collectors (those that use reference counting) from deallocating unused objects.
Causes and solutions
In very large software designs, software engineers may lose the context and inadvertently introduce circular dependencies. There are tools to analyze software and find unwanted circular dependencies.[3]
Circular dependencies can be introduced when implementing callback functionality. This can be avoided by applying design patterns like the observer pattern.
See also
References
- ^ a b Lakos, John (1996-07-20). Large-Scale C++ Software Design (1st ed.). Boston: Addison-Wesley. ISBN 9780201633627.
- ^ Melton, Hayden; Tempero, Ewan (2007-01-12). "An empirical study of cycles among classes in Java". Empirical Software Engineering. 12 (4): 389–415. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.141.5362. doi:10.1007/s10664-006-9033-1. ISSN 1382-3256. S2CID 11134940.
- ^ JDepend for Java