Should Class Helpers be used in developing new code?

Question

Delphi 8 introduced Class Helpers for the purposes of mapping the VCL/RTL to the .NET object hierarchy. They allow injecting methods into an existing class without overriding t

Answer 1

I find myself using them more and more as a design construct.

Situations in which I use them :

• In a client/server setup, I extend shared base-classes with class helpers to provide server- or client-only functionality.
• To complement VCL/RTL classes (and other third party code) with handy tooling functions.
• To work around differences when classes don't share the same inheritance tree (using helpers makes it possible to have have generic Count and Items properties, for example).

In fact, I wish Delphi would accept multiple helpers for the same base class - I've even filed a request for this if I'm remembering correctly.