Improvements for ugly reflection

Question

I have a project that uses a library to save serialized objects in items and loads them again, when needed.
To do the de-/serialization, this library uses Gson.

Due to how Gson works and how the library is set up, I can't add support for custom types easily and thus have to rely heavily on reflection.
I don't like this, but it has to be like this, sadly.

I am asking, whether there is a way to make this code use more Kotlin idioms.
My issue is that because the fields I am accessing are private, the usual reflection using :: doesn't work.

Anyways, here is my code:

/**
 * Registers a custom GSON handler to handle the [Location] class.
 */
private fun registerGsonHandlers() {
 logger.entering(LobbyMain::class, "registerGsonHandlers")
 // Gets private static final Gson gson = new Gson();
 val fGson = NBTReflectionUtil::class.java.getDeclaredField("gson")
 fGson.isAccessible = true
 val modifiersField = Field::class.java.getDeclaredField("modifiers")
 modifiersField.isAccessible = true
 modifiersField.setInt(fGson, fGson.modifiers and Modifier.FINAL.inv())
 // Gets private final List<TypeAdapterFactory> factories;
 val fFactories = Gson::class.java.getDeclaredField("factories")
 fFactories.isAccessible = true
 val factories = fFactories.get(fGson.get(null)) as List<*>
 // Sets private static final Gson gson
 fGson.set(null, GsonBuilder().apply {
 registerTypeAdapter(Location::class.java, LocationTypeAdapter)
 factories.forEach { this::registerTypeAdapterFactory }
 }.create())
 logger.exiting(LobbyMain::class, "registerGsonHandlers")
}

It pulls the Gson object out of the NBTReflectionUtil class, makes it modifiable and gets its list of TypeAdapterFactories.
I then create a new Gson object with all the old TypeAdapters and mine added and set it as the new Gson object for the library.

Answer 1

I'd group your code to make it more readable. Something like this:

fun getGson(): Field {
 val fGson = NBTReflectionUtil::class.java.getDeclaredField("gson")
 fGson.isAccessible = true
}
fun removeFinalModifier(field: Field) {
 val modifiersField = Field::class.java.getDeclaredField("modifiers")
 modifiersField.isAccessible = true
 modifiersField.setInt(fGson, fGson.modifiers and Modifier.FINAL.inv())
}
// etc