Is this Factory Method creation pattern?

Question

I have been using factory method creation pattern for awhile now. I was just recently told that this:

public static class ScheduleTypeFactory
{
    public st         


        

Answer 1

I'm surprised so many saying that this is the factory pattern. (So chances are that I'm thinking of this wrong, so please let me know.)

It looks to me like what you have there is only a part of the design. If you call it from your client, it's referred to as a "simple" factory, but it's not really considered a design pattern. (Don't get me wrong, I do this all the time).

The factory design pattern would state that your factory inherits/implements an abstract factory/factory interface.

Then, in your class which needs to use the factory (the client), you set the type of the factory to the abstract/interface, creating a concrete factory: i.e. --> IFactory factory = new ConcreteFactory();

The concrete factory would then create your IScheduleItem (leaving it to the factory to actually create the concrete type).

In the end I think the whole point is about loose coupling. While a "simple" factory loosely couples the construction of the product from the client, it does not decouple the factory. The factory pattern also decouples the factory.

Then again, it's early, I haven't had coffee, and I have a nasty habit of posting absolutely horrible responses that miss the entire point of the question.