dissertation statement validation - runtime class definition manipulation

>
> I hope you guys don't mind, but in writing my dissertation and there is
> no one local with Smalltalk experience to double-check some statements
> that I'm making.  Over the next few weeks I'd like to bounce a few off
> the list, mainly for a simple "thats not right".    For the first....
>
> "In languages like C++ and Java the class definition is just text in a
> file that is compiled into a runtime, and the class definition _cannot_
> be defined or changed by that runtime. In Smalltalk you develop from
> inside the runtime image, so the runtime manipulate the class definition
> like any other object of the system."
>  
>
> So what I want to check is that is it true to say you can't do that with
> C++ and Java  ?  

> On 2013-06-02 08:01, [hidden email] wrote:
>>
>> I hope you guys don't mind, but in writing my dissertation and there is
>> no one local with Smalltalk experience to double-check some statements
>> that I'm making.  Over the next few weeks I'd like to bounce a few off
>> the list, mainly for a simple "thats not right".    For the first....
>>
>> "In languages like C++ and Java the class definition is just text in a
>> file that is compiled into a runtime, and the class definition _cannot_
>> be defined or changed by that runtime. In Smalltalk you develop from
>> inside the runtime image, so the runtime manipulate the class definition
>> like any other object of the system."
>>
>>
>> So what I want to check is that is it true to say you can't do that with
>> C++ and Java  ?  
>
> I don't know about C++ but for Java there are libraries like CGLib[1] or
> ASM[2] that can manipulate/generate classes/interfaces at runtime.
> However the operation is not even remotely like editing code!  It's
> writing code to change or generate the bytecode.
>
> [1] http://cglib.sourceforge.net/
> [2] http://asm.ow2.org/