1

CHAPTER 6 INHERITANCE AND

POLYMORPHISM
Prepared by Mr. KAY HENG
 2

INHERITANCE
 3

Inheritance
1. What is Inheritance?
2. Why Inheritance?
3. How to use it?
4. Superclass & Subclass

5. Using keyword super

6. Overriding Methods
7. The Object class
 4

1. WHAT IS
INHERITANCE?
 5

1. What is Inheritance? (1)

• OOP has 3 features:
1. Class Encapsulation
2. Inheritance
3. Polymorphism
• OOP allows you to derive (create) new objects from
existing classes. E.g.
• You can create objects from a class:
• Circle cir = new Circle();
• Word w = new Word(“W E S T E R N”);
 6

1. What is Inheritance? (2)

• But OOP has other mechanisms. One of them is called
Inheritance.
• Inheritance is a mechanism to make classes inherit
properties/methods from an existing class.
• Inherit (v) ¬TTYlekrþtMENl¦
• Inheritance (n) receiving properties
 7

1. What is Inheritance? (3)

• In fact, every class in Java is always inherited from an
existing class, either explicitly or implicitly.
• In Java, every class is inherited from java.lang.Object.
To be clear, please look at an example at
next slide.
 8

1. What is Inheritance? (4) - Example

1. Please create a blank class, say, BlankSample
public class BlankSample {

}
2. Then create a test class, say, TestBlank
public class TestBlank {
public static void main(String[] args){
BlankSample bs = new BlankSample();
System.out.print(bs.toString());
}
}
The question is why we can call bs.toString()?
If we look at BlankSample, there is toString(). Why?
 9

1. What is Inheritance? (5) - IDE

 10

1. What is Inheritance? (6)

• Where these methods come from?
They are from java.lang.Object. Because every class in
Java inherits from java.lang.Object.
• To be sure, please look at the API and find out
java.lang.Object. Then see its methods.
• clone(), equals(Object obj),
finalize(), getClass(),
hashCode(), notify(),
notifyAll(), toString() and
wait()
 11

2. WHY INHERITANCE?
 12

2. Why Inheritance?
• Classes often share capabilities
• We want to avoid re-coding these capabilities
• Reuse of these would be best to
• Improve maintainability
• Reduce cost
• Improve “real world” modeling
 13

2. Why Inheritance? -Benefits

• No need to reinvent the wheel.
• Allows us to build on existing codes without having to
copy it and past it or rewrite it again, etc.
• To create the subclass, we need to program only the
differences between the superclass and the subclass that
inherits from it.
• Make class more flexible.
 14

3. HOW TO USE IT?

 15

3. How to use it? (1)

• In Java, to enable a class inherit an existing class, we have to use a keyword
“extends”. For example, we have Circle class:

public class Circle{

private double radius;

public Circle(){}
public Circle(double radius){
this.radius = radius;
}
public void setRadius(double radius){
this.radius = radius;
}
public double findArea(){
return radius * radius *3.14;
}
}
 16

3. How to use it? (2)

• Then we want another class, say, TestCircle, inherits from the
Circle class.
public class TestCircle extends Circle{
public static void main(String[] args){
TestCircle tc1 = new TestCircle();
tc1.setRadius(5.0);
System.out.println(tc1.findArea());
}
}
• Please note that TestCircle didn’t define setRadius() and
getArea() methods but it could use the methods.
• The reason is TestCircle inherits from Circle class.
 17

3. How to use it? – Note (1)

• Usually inheritance is used to improve features of an
existing class.
• Please look at the code on page 288, listing 8.1 First
Version of the Cylinder class.
• The Circle has already the findArea()
• So the formula to find Cylinder’s Volume is :
volume = Area * length
 18

3. How to use it? – Note (2)

public class Cylinder extends Circle {

private double length = 1;

public double getLength(){

return length;
}
public void setLength(double length){
this.length = length;
}
public double findVolume(){
return findArea() * length;
}
}
 19

3. How to use it? – Note (3)

public class TestCylinder {
public static void main(String[] args){
Cylinder c1 = new Cylinder();
c1.setRadius(2.5); // from Circle
c1.setLength(5); // from Cylinder
System.out.println(c1.findVolume());
}
}
• Please note that the cylinder’s object, c1, could call a method,
“setLength()”, from Cylinder class and also could call a method,
“setRadius()”, from Circle class.
 20

4. SUPERCLASS &
SUBCLASS
 21

4. Superclass & Subclass (1)

• The cylinder class inherits features from circle
class. Then,
• Cylinder is subclass
• Circle is superclass

Circle Cylinder

Super inherit Subclass

 22

4. Superclass & Subclass (2)

Quick Check:
C1 <- C2 <- C3 <- C4
What are superclass and subclass?
- C1 is the superclass of C2, C3, & C4
- C2 are the subclass of C1 and the superclass of C3 & C4
- C3 are the subclass of C1 & C2 and the superclass of C4
- C4 is the subclass of C1, C2 & C3
• It means if we call the final subclass, e.g. C4, then we can
use features from C1, C2, C3, and, of course, C4 itself.
 23

4. Superclass & Subclass (3) – Java API

• Please check API Documentation: Javax.swing.JFrame is the subclass of
Frame,Window,Container,Component,Object. So if we use JFrame, it
means we use features from all of the superclasses.
 24

4. Superclass & Subclass (4)

• Sample of using JFrame
import javax.swing.*;

public class TestJFrame extends JFrame {

public static void main(String[] args){
TestJFrame frame = new TestJFrame();
frame.setTitle("Hi I am JFrame");
frame.setSize(400,300);
frame.setVisible(true);
frame.setDefaultCloseOperation(
JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);
}
} // Note the underline codes
 25

5. USING KEYWORD
SUPER
 26

5. Using keyword super (1)

• super is used to call:
1. Constructors of the superclass
2. Methods of the superclass
 27

Using keyword super (2)

• To call constructors of the superclass
super(); //call no-arg constructor
super(5.0); //call arg constructor
• Note

super():
1. MUST be written in the 1st line of subclass constructors
2. Cannot be written in other methods
3.Is the only way to call superclass constructor.
 28

Using keyword super (3)

• To call methods of the superclass
super.setRadius(5); // setRadius(5);
super.findArea();
super.toString();

Note:
• This keyword is not always used to call methods from superclass.
• We can call superclass methods by calling directly the methods
name. Please look at slide # 14.
• However, super is used not to confuse with the name of the
overriding methods.
 29

6. OVERRIDING
METHODS
 30

Overriding Methods (1)

In the real world:
• Researchers sometimes never invent or find a new
thing. In fact, they just improve an existing thing.
• To improve the thing, they just:
1. Add new features
2. Modify existing features.
 31

Overriding Methods (2)

In OOP:
It is true to the both things above. The inheritance helps
us to do these. We can:
1. Add new methods to existing class
2. Modify the existing features. It is called Overriding
Methods.
 32

Overriding Methods (3)

• Overriding method is a technique to modify a method in
the superclass.
• Overriding method is a method, defined in subclass,
which has the same name and return type to a method in
superclass.
For example:
- The Circle has findArea() but Cylinder doesn’t has it. If we
call findArea(), it is always the Circle’s.
- But the cylinder can have findArea() for itself. This
implementation is called overriding method.
 33

Overriding Methods (3)

• Please look at the code on page 292, Listing 8.2.
 34

Important Note (1)

1. In the subclass, we can invoke accessible things, e.g.
public methods or constructor, from the superclass.
E.g.:
- After a class inherits JFrame, then we can call setTitle(),
setSize(), setVisible() etc.
2. In a constructor of subclass, the non-arg constructor of
the superclass is ALWAYS invoked. Let see slide “Important
Note (2)”.
3. A subclass can NEVER inherit a superclass which has
no non-arg constructor. Let see slide “Important Note (3)”.
 35

Important Note (2)

//Circle class
public class Circle{
private double radius;
public Circle(){ // non-arg constructor
radius = 5;
}
public double findArea(){
return radius * radius * 3.14;
}
}
//TestCircle class
public class TestCircle extends Circle {
public static void main(String[] args){
TestCircle tc = new TestCircle();
System.out.println(tc.findArea());//output: 78.5
}
}
 36

Important Note (3)

//Circle class
public class Circle{
private double radius;
//It doesn’t have non-arg constructor Here
public Circle(double radius){
this.radius = radius;
}
public double findArea(){
return radius * radius * 3.14;
}
}
//TestCircle class
public class TestCircle extends Circle {
public static void main(String[] args){
} cannot find symbol
symbol: constructor Circle()
} location: class Circle

1 error
 37

THE OBJECT CLASS

 38

The Object class (1)

• public boolean equals(Object object)
Indicates whether a object is "equal to" this one. E.g.:
Circle c1 = new Circle();
if(c1.equals(c1)){
}
Note: We have to override it to test our comparison.
• public int hashCode()
Returns a hash code value for the object. see “Java
Collection Framework.”
 39

The Object class (2)

• public String toString()
Return a string that represents the object. e.g.
Circle c1 = new Circle();
c1.toString();
//output: Circle@24efe3
Note: We have to override it to display our wise.