Making an object that can be various types?

[deft pagoda]

I have a byte[] and a short[] used for the same thing.
I want to switch from using the byte[] and short[] based on the maximum value needed, which changes occasionally.
My idea is to have an Object that is swapped between referencing the byte[] or the short[] as needed.
The part I can't figure out is casting the Object to the array type its referencing. I tried this to alter the contents of the array the object is referencing:

 ((array.getClass())(array))[pos] = ...

but it just says "the result of getClass() is unused" (aka it isnt trying to cast the Object with the result like i want it to)

[brazen jacinth]

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[tough flicker]

Why aren't you always using a short[]?

but no you can't cast like that

what you could do in principle is create wrapper classes for each type of array with a common (sealed) interface but I don't see much of a point in that tbh

[deft pagoda]

memory usage

this is for chunks of data

with palette compression

so if the palette only has 1 or 2 values i can use an array of booleans to reference that palette

if it has 2-127 values i can use an array of bytes

then shorts for values above that

[stable tendon]

but it just says "the result of getClass() is unused" (aka it isnt trying to cast the Object with the result like i want it to)

is this an error

or a warning

[deft pagoda]

warning

[stable tendon]

o

[deft pagoda]

it also says this

if i hover over the red part

[stable tendon]

you could ig use an if statement

to know when to swap

[deft pagoda]

yeah i can i just wanted something cleaner and less annoying to make

plus it would be faster to not have to use those if statements

[stable tendon]

one if statement doesnt sound too bad tbh

so yea try that

[deft pagoda]

yeah that reduced memory usage from 1.54gb to 1.03gb

worth

and the savings from adding the boolean array might be even bigger