In the introduction to inheritance lesson, we mentioned that one of the biggest benefits of using derived classes is the ability to reuse already written code. You can inherit the base class functionality and then add new functionality, modify existing functionality, or hide functionality you don’t want. In this and …
In the previous lessons in this chapter, you’ve learned a bit about how base inheritance works. In all of our examples so far, we’ve used public inheritance. That is, our derived class publicly inherits the base class. In this lesson, we’ll take a closer look at public inheritance, as well …
In the past two lessons, we’ve explored some basics around inheritance in C++ and the order that derived classes are initialized. In this lesson, we’ll take a closer look at the role of constructors in the initialization of derived classes. To do so, we will continue to use the simple …
In the previous lesson on basic inheritance in C++, you learned that classes can inherit members and functions from other classes. In this lesson, we’re going to take a closer look at the order of construction that happens when a derived class is instantiated. First, let’s introduce some new classes …
Now that we’ve talked about what inheritance is in an abstract sense, let’s talk about how it’s used within C++. Inheritance in C++ takes place between classes. In an inheritance (is-a) relationship, the class being inherited from is called the parent class, base class, or superclass, and the class doing …
Consider the following example: #include <iostream> int add(int x, int y) { int sum{ x + y }; // stores x + y in a variable return sum; // returns value of that variable } int main() { std::cout << add(5, 3) << ‘\n’; return 0; } In the add() …
In the last chapter, we discussed object composition, where complex classes are constructed from simpler classes and types. Object composition is perfect for building new objects that have a “has-a” relationship with their parts. However, object composition is just one of the two major ways that C++ lets you construct …
In this section, we’ll address some of the common issues that new programmers seem to run across with fairly high probability. This is not meant to be a comprehensive list of compilation or execution problems, but rather a pragmatic list of solutions to very basic issues. If you have any …
In real life, we use containers all the time. Your breakfast cereal comes in a box, the pages in your book come inside a cover and binding, and you might store any number of items in containers in your garage. Without containers, it would be extremely inconvenient to work with …
In the previous lesson , we noted that object composition is the process of creating complex objects from simpler ones. We also talked about one type of object composition, called composition. In a composition relationship, the whole object is responsible for the existence of the part. In this lesson, we’ll …
