CS SE 1209 & IT 1210

Lecture 07
Polymorphism
16/07/2024
Bachelor of Science (Hons) in Computer Science | Software Engineering | Information Technology
Department of Computing
Faculty of Computing and Technology
Saegis Campus
Nugegoda

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Lecturer Name Saegis Campus
Polymorphism
• It is a feature, which lets us create functions with same name but different arguments,
which will perform different actions.

• That means, functions with same name, but functioning in different ways.

• Or, it also allows us to redefine a function to provide it with a completely new definition.

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Polymorphism
• Generally, polymorphism refers to the ability to appear in many forms.

• The word polymorphism is a combination of two Greek words.

poly + morphs
many forms

• There are two ways to implementing polymorphism.

1.Method overloading
2.Method overriding

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Example

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Method signatures
• Signatures consist of the function name and the type and order of its
parameters.

• Examples:
setExam(int)
getCoursework()

• Note the parameter names are not included.

• Any documentation/description will usually use the signature in this

form.

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Method Overloading
• If you have two methods with same name in one Java class with different method signature
then its called an overloaded method.

• Have different set of arguments to perform something based on different number of input.

• Binding of overloading method occurs during compile time and overloaded calls resolved using
static binding. (Also known as Early binding)

• To overload a Java method just change its signature.

• Just remember in order to change signature you either need to change number of argument,
type of argument or order of argument in Java if they are of different types.

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Three ways to overload a method
1.Number of parameters.
▪add(int, int)
▪add(int, int, int)
2.Data type of parameters.
▪add(int, int)
▪add(int, float)
3. Sequence of Data type of parameters
▪add(int, float)
▪add(float, int)

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Constructor Overloading
• Consider the constructors in the Marks class:
• Marks() - has no parameters (initialises both attributes with -1, i.e. no
mark recorded)
• Marks(int, int) has two parameters, one for each attribute.

• There are two constructors, same function name but different signatures.

• Known as constructor overloading.

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Method Overriding

• Overridden methods have the same method signature & only the method body is
different in sub classes.

• Method overriding forms the basis for one of Java’s most powerful concepts:
Dynamic method dispatch

• Dynamic method dispatch is the mechanism by which a call to an overridden

method is resolved at run time rather than compile time.

• It is important because this is how Java implements run-time polymorphism.

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Polymorphism in OOP
• The most common use of polymorphism in OOP occurs when a
parent class reference is used to refer to a child class object.
Animal a =new Dog ();

Reference Type Object Type

• It gives the ability of a reference variable to change behavior

according to what object instance it is holding.

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Example-Method Overloading

• When there are multiple

functions with the same name
but different parameters then
these functions are said to be
overloaded.

• Functions can be overloaded by

changes in the number of
arguments or/and a change in
the type of arguments.

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Example-Method Overloading

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Example-Method Overriding

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Example-Method Overriding

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Lecturer Name Saegis Campus