A static constructor is used to initialize the static data member for a class.

Here is the syntax for defining a static constructor:

constructor static <class-name> ():
  <body of constructor>
end constructor.

Syntax Element

Description

class-name

Must match the name of the class in the class definition.

body of constructor

The ABL code necessary to implement the functionality of the constructor.

Here is the code for the static constructor of the Corporation class. Notice that it creates an instance of Enterprise.Corporation by calling the default constructor for Enterprise.Corporation. In this static constructor, you must fully specify the name of the class. The default constructor returns an instance of Corporation. The static constructor then assigns this value to the static data member named Instance. After this constructor runs, there is a single instance of the Corporation class running in the AVM.

constructor static Corporation ( ): 
  Enterprise.Corporation:Instance = new  Enterprise.Corporation(). 
end constructor.