我真的很喜欢http://python-3-patterns-idioms-test.readthedocs.io/en/latest/Visitor.html上的描述和例子。

The assumption is that you have a primary class hierarchy that is fixed; perhaps it’s from another vendor and you can’t make changes to that hierarchy. However, your intent is that you’d like to add new polymorphic methods to that hierarchy, which means that normally you’d have to add something to the base class interface. So the dilemma is that you need to add methods to the base class, but you can’t touch the base class. How do you get around this? The design pattern that solves this kind of problem is called a “visitor” (the final one in the Design Patterns book), and it builds on the double dispatching scheme shown in the last section. The visitor pattern allows you to extend the interface of the primary type by creating a separate class hierarchy of type Visitor to virtualize the operations performed upon the primary type. The objects of the primary type simply “accept” the visitor, then call the visitor’s dynamically-bound member function.

你困惑的原因可能是来客是一个致命的用词不当。许多(杰出的)程序员都曾遇到过这个问题。它实际做的是用本身不支持它的语言(大多数语言不支持)实现双重调度。

1)我最喜欢的例子是《Effective c++》的作者Scott Meyers，他称这是他最重要的c++啊哈之一!的时刻。

访问者模式作为方面对象编程的地下实现。

例如，如果您定义一个新操作，而不改变其操作的元素的类

Quick description of the visitor pattern. The classes that require modification must all implement the 'accept' method. Clients call this accept method to perform some new action on that family of classes thereby extending their functionality. Clients are able to use this one accept method to perform a wide range of new actions by passing in a different visitor class for each specific action. A visitor class contains multiple overridden visit methods defining how to achieve that same specific action for every class within the family. These visit methods get passed an instance on which to work.

当你考虑使用它的时候

When you have a family of classes you know your going to have to add many new actions them all, but for some reason you are not able to alter or recompile the family of classes in the future. When you want to add a new action and have that new action entirely defined within one the visitor class rather than spread out across multiple classes. When your boss says you must produce a range of classes which must do something right now!... but nobody actually knows exactly what that something is yet.

虽然我知道如何做，何时做，但我一直不明白为什么。为了对有c++等语言背景的人有所帮助，请仔细阅读本文。

对于懒惰的人，我们使用访问者模式，因为“虽然在c++中虚函数是动态分派的，但函数重载是静态完成的”。

或者，换句话说，当你传递一个实际绑定到ApolloSpacecraft对象的飞船引用时，确保CollideWith(ApolloSpacecraft&)被调用。

class SpaceShip {};
class ApolloSpacecraft : public SpaceShip {};
class ExplodingAsteroid : public Asteroid {
public:
  virtual void CollideWith(SpaceShip&) {
    cout << "ExplodingAsteroid hit a SpaceShip" << endl;
  }
  virtual void CollideWith(ApolloSpacecraft&) {
    cout << "ExplodingAsteroid hit an ApolloSpacecraft" << endl;
  }
}

感谢@Federico A. Ramponi的精彩解释，我只是在java版本中做了这个。希望对大家有所帮助。

正如@Konrad Rudolph指出的那样，这实际上是使用两个具体实例一起确定运行时方法的双重分派。

因此，实际上，只要正确定义了操作接口，就不需要为操作执行器创建公共接口。

import static java.lang.System.out;
public class Visitor_2 {
    public static void main(String...args) {
        Hearen hearen = new Hearen();
        FoodImpl food = new FoodImpl();
        hearen.showTheHobby(food);
        Katherine katherine = new Katherine();
        katherine.presentHobby(food);
    }
}

interface Hobby {
    void insert(Hearen hearen);
    void embed(Katherine katherine);
}


class Hearen {
    String name = "Hearen";
    void showTheHobby(Hobby hobby) {
        hobby.insert(this);
    }
}

class Katherine {
    String name = "Katherine";
    void presentHobby(Hobby hobby) {
        hobby.embed(this);
    }
}

class FoodImpl implements Hobby {
    public void insert(Hearen hearen) {
        out.println(hearen.name + " start to eat bread");
    }
    public void embed(Katherine katherine) {
        out.println(katherine.name + " start to eat mango");
    }
}

正如您所期望的那样，公共接口将为我们带来更多的清晰度，尽管它实际上并不是这个模式的基本部分。

import static java.lang.System.out;
public class Visitor_2 {
    public static void main(String...args) {
        Hearen hearen = new Hearen();
        FoodImpl food = new FoodImpl();
        hearen.showHobby(food);
        Katherine katherine = new Katherine();
        katherine.showHobby(food);
    }
}

interface Hobby {
    void insert(Hearen hearen);
    void insert(Katherine katherine);
}

abstract class Person {
    String name;
    protected Person(String n) {
        this.name = n;
    }
    abstract void showHobby(Hobby hobby);
}

class Hearen extends  Person {
    public Hearen() {
        super("Hearen");
    }
    @Override
    void showHobby(Hobby hobby) {
        hobby.insert(this);
    }
}

class Katherine extends Person {
    public Katherine() {
        super("Katherine");
    }

    @Override
    void showHobby(Hobby hobby) {
        hobby.insert(this);
    }
}

class FoodImpl implements Hobby {
    public void insert(Hearen hearen) {
        out.println(hearen.name + " start to eat bread");
    }
    public void insert(Katherine katherine) {
        out.println(katherine.name + " start to eat mango");
    }
}