>Is hardcoding classnames the way to go ? What if I change the name of a class or want to add in another layer does this means I need to edit all my code.

Check out creating an Abstract Factory pattern object for your aps. This will allow you to hardcode the class 'token' which the AF looks up in your 'lookup' table to determine the true class name.

See _Design Patterns_ by Gamma, Helm, Johnson, Vlissides

BOb