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Should superclasses be abstract?

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Object-Oriented Programming (ECOOP 1994)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 821))

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Abstract

In object-oriented design and languages, abstractness of classes is a concept whose relationship to other concepts is not yet fully understood and agreed upon. This paper clarifies the concept of abstractness and examines the relationship between abstractness and inheritance. It does this by discussing several aspects of the so-called abstract superclass rule, a design rule for object-oriented programming which requires that all superclasses be abstract. In the course of this discussion, we evaluate in which situations this rule should be considered beneficial.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Computer Science, Northeastern University, 360 Huntington Avenue, 02115, Boston, MA, USA

    Walter L. Hürsch

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  1. Walter L. Hürsch
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Mario Tokoro Remo Pareschi

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© 1994 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Hürsch, W.L. (1994). Should superclasses be abstract?. In: Tokoro, M., Pareschi, R. (eds) Object-Oriented Programming. ECOOP 1994. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 821. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/BFb0052174

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BFb0052174

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-58202-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-48567-4

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