static accessors to various classes

Scripting
1

So I have lately been doing something like this

public class MyClass
{
static public MyClass staticThis;

void Awake()
{
staticThis = this;
}

void AllMyShit()
{

}

void Whatevs()
{

}

}

And then from anywhere in my entire game I can access the last created instance of MyClass via MyClass.staticThis

This is seeming really useful and easy to me… but it seems almost too easy. Am I doing something with this practice that is generally a bad idea that I shouldn’t be doing?

2

Generally, you declare variables to be private and have functions to set and get that variable. If it’s not an important variable, then it doesn’t matter.

3

One potential problem is that “staticThis” won’t necessarily be available in other scripts’ Awake functions, unless you make use of script execution order. Also, it’s public read/write, which means it could potentially be changed, which isn’t likely, but you can still kill two birds with one stone:

public class MyClass : MonoBehaviour {
	static MyClass _staticThis;
	static public MyClass staticThis {
		get {
			if (_staticThis == null) _staticThis = FindObjectOfType(typeof(MyClass)) as MyClass;
			return _staticThis;
		}
	}
	// other stuff
}

–Eric

4

Thank you eric, as always your help is greatly appreciated.