- Encapsulation
- Inheritance
- Abstraction
- Polymorphism
Encapsulation
Encapsulation is the process of hiding information within an object so that it cannot be accessed directly from outside the object. This allows you to control how data is used and prevents accidental modification of data. For example, you could have a class called Person with attributes such as name and age. You could then create methods to get and set these attributes. This would allow you to control how the data is used, and you could add validation to ensure that the data is valid before it is set.
Encapsulation is important because it helps to keep your data safe and secure. It also allows you to change the implementation of your code without affecting the rest of your codebase.
Inheritance
Inheritance is the ability of one class to inherit the attributes and methods of another class. This is useful because it allows you to create subclasses that are specialized versions of a parent class. For example, you could have a parent class called Vehicle, with subclasses Car and Truck. The Vehicle class would contain general attributes and methods that are common to all vehicles, such as the number of wheels and the color. The Car and Truck subclasses would then each have their own unique attributes and methods, such as the number of doors and the size of the engine.
Inheritance is important in Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) because it allows for code reuse. This means that you can write code once and then use it in multiple places, which makes your code more efficient and maintainable.
Abstraction
Abstraction is the process of hiding the implementation details of an object so that it can be used without understanding how it works. This allows you to create code that is easy to use and maintain. For example, you could have a class called Vehicle with methods such as drive and stop. The details of how these methods work are hidden from the user, so they can simply call the methods and trust that they will work as expected.
Abstraction is important because it allows you to create code that is easy to use and understand. Abstraction allows the user to use your code without needing to know the details of how it works.
Polymorphism
Polymorphism is the ability of an object to take on multiple forms. This is useful because it allows you to create code that is more flexible and adaptable. For example, you could have a class called Shape with subclasses Circle and Rectangle. The Shape class would contain general methods such as getArea and getPerimeter. The Circle and Rectangle subclasses would then each have their own unique implementation of these methods.
Polymorphism is important because it allows you to write code that is more flexible and adaptable. Polymorphism allows you to write code that can be used with multiple types of objects.