How can I make the return type of a method generic

Question

Is there a way to figure out the return type at runtime without the extra parameter using instanceof? Or at least by passing a class of the type instead of a dummy instance.
I understand generics are for compile time type-checking, but is there a workaround for this?

Answer 1

First of all, define callFriend:

public <T extends Animal> T callFriend(String name, Class<T> type) {
    return type.cast(friends.get(name));
}

Then call it as such:

jerry.callFriend("spike", Dog.class).bark();
jerry.callFriend("quacker", Duck.class).quack();

This code has the benefit of not generating any compiler warnings. This is really just an updated version of casting from the pre-generic days and doesn't add any additional safety.