Is there a way to refer to the current type with a type variable?

Question

Suppose I\'m trying to write a function to return an instance of the current type. Is there a way to make T refer to the exact subtype (so T should

Answer 1

I found a way do this, it's sort of silly but it works:

In the top level class (A):

protected final  T a(T type) {
        return type
}

Assuming C extends B and B extends A.

Invoking:

C c = new C();
//Any order is fine and you have compile time safety and IDE assistance.
c.setA("a").a(c).setB("b").a(c).setC("c");