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Chapter 5-Polymorphism

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2 views8 pages

Chapter 5-Polymorphism

oop note

Uploaded by

michael.tegegn
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Object Oriented Programming

Computer Engineering Department


AASTU
November, 2021
Chapter 5
Polymorphism

2
Polymorphism
Polymorphism is a Greek word meaning “many
forms”.
Polymorphism enables us to “program in the general”
rather than “program in the specific.”
Example: Suppose we create a program that
simulates the movement of several types of animals
for a biological study.
 Classes Fish, Frog and Bird represent the three types of
animals under investigation.
 Imagine that each of these classes extends superclass
Animal, which contains a method move and maintains an
animal’s current location as x-y coordinates.

3
Polymorphism(cont’d)
 To simulate the animals’ movements, the program sends each
object the same message once per second.
 However, each specific type of Animal responds to a move
message in a unique way
 a Fish might swim three feet, a Frog might jump five feet and a
Bird might fly ten feet.
 The program issues the same message (i.e., move ) to each
animal object generically, but each object knows how to
modify its x-y coordinates appropriately for its specific type
of movement.

The same message (in this case, move ) sent to a


variety of objects has “many forms” of results—
hence the term polymorphism.

4
Polymorphism(cont’d)
E.g. 2 One person present in different behaviors:
 Suppose if you are in class room that time you behave like a student,
when you are in market at that time you behave like a customer,
when you at your home at that time you behave like a son or
daughter.

The most common use of polymorphism in OOP occurs


when a parent class reference is used to refer to a child
class object.
The following two output statements will produce different
results, depending on whether p is a Dog or a Cat:
Pet p;
p = new Dog( );
System.out.println(p.speak( ));
p = new Cat( );
5
Example
class Pet {
private String name;
public String getName( ) {
return name;
}
public void setName(String petName) {
name = petName;
}
public String speak( ) {
return "I'm your cuddly little pet.";
}
}
class Cat extends Pet {
public String speak( ) {
return "Don't give me orders.\n" + "I speak only when I want to.";
}
}
6
Example(cont’d)
class Dog extends Pet {
public String fetch( ) {
return "Yes, master. Fetch I will.";
}
}
===============================
public class RunPetDog{
public static void main(String args[]){
Pet p;
p = new Dog( );
System.out.println(p.speak( ));
p = new Cat( );
System.out.println(p.speak( ));

}
7
}
Example(cont’d)
Output
I’m Your cuddly little pet
Don’t give me orders
I speak only when I want

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