Finding Game Objects and Components in Unity with a Simple Pattern

Published July 04, 2018 by Ahmed Sabry, posted by Ahmed Sabry
Do you see issues with this article? Let us know.
Advertisement

I have some fun here for those who search for game objects and components in the scenes using Unity:


GameObject.Find("") , FindObjectOfType<> , GetComponent<>

Or any other searching method. And since searching for objects and components is a high cost operation and annoying for some people. This is a very simple and easy pattern that will make the process easier.
We start with making a class StaticObjectwhich holds the game object, its name, and a reference to its components that we will need to use.

And then we create a class AllStaticObjects, which holds a list of the StaticObject to assign in the inspector, and an indexer to search for the desired game object by its name.

Second step is creating a class StaticObjectComponentwhich holds a component and its name. Then a class AllComponentswhich holds a list of, StaticObjectComponent to assign in the inspector, and an indexer to search for the desired component by its name.

Of course we don't forget to mark all the classes as 


[System.Serializable]

So that they be displayed in the inspector.

In our manager script, we make a singleton, and a public reference to AllStaticObjects class to assign them from the inspector. Now, if we want to access a game object we can just type it like this:


GameObject ui =(GameObject)StaticObjectsManager.Instance.AllObjects["UI Canvas"].TheGameObject;

if we want to access a component, we will do:


var animation = (Animation)StaticObjectsManager.Instance.AllObjects["UI Canvas"].AllComponents["Animation"].Component;

This is the full code.


using System;
using System.Collections;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using UnityEngine;
 
[System.Serializable]
public class AllStaticObjects
{
    public List<StaticObject> Objects;
 
    public StaticObject this[string name]
    {
        get
        {
            foreach (StaticObject staticObject in Objects)
            {
                if (staticObject.Name == name)
                {
                    return (staticObject);
                }
            }
 
            throw (new MissingReferenceException("The game object with name -" + name + "- is not found"));
        }
    }
}
 
[System.Serializable]
public class StaticObject
{
    public string Name;
    public GameObject TheGameObject;
    public AllComponents AllComponents;
}
 
[System.Serializable]
public class AllComponents
{
    public List<StaticObjectComponent> Components;
 
    public StaticObjectComponent this[string name]
    {
        get
        {
            foreach (StaticObjectComponent component in Components)
            {
                if (component.Name == name)
                {
                    return (component);
                }
            }
 
            throw (new MissingReferenceException("The component with name -" + name + "- is not found in the game object " + name));
        }
    }
}
 
[System.Serializable]
public class StaticObjectComponent
{
    public string Name;
    public Component Component;
}
 
public class StaticObjectsManager : MonoBehaviour
{
    public static StaticObjectsManager Instance;
 
    #region Singleton
    private void Awake()
    {
        if (Instance == null)
        {
            Instance = this;
            DontDestroyOnLoad(gameObject);
        }
        else
        {
            Destroy(gameObject);
        }
    }
    #endregion
 
    #region Game Objects
    public AllStaticObjects AllObjects;
    #endregion
}

 

Cancel Save
0 Likes 0 Comments

Comments

Nobody has left a comment. You can be the first!
You must log in to join the conversation.
Don't have a GameDev.net account? Sign up!

A simple pattern for people who want to avoid the headache of Finding Game Objects and Components by searching for them.

Advertisement
Advertisement

Other Tutorials by Ahmed Sabry

Ahmed Sabry has not posted any other tutorials. Encourage them to write more!
Advertisement