INHERITANCE IN JAVA
-Compiled by Nikahat Mulla
Agenda
• Inheritance
• Introduction
• Types of Inheritance
• Example and Syntax
• Inheritance without constructors
• Inheritance with constructors
• super keyword uses
2
Inheritance
• Capability of a class to use the properties & methods of another class
while adding its own functionality
• A class derived from another class is called as subclass / derived
class / extended class / child class
• The class from which the subclass is derived is called as superclass /
base class / parent class
• Each class is allowed to have one direct superclass
• Each superclass can have unlimited number of subclasses
Inheritance (Contd…)
Super Class
Sub Class
Sub Class
Types of inheritance
• Single
• Multi-level
• Multiple
• Hybrid
Single Inheritance
Single Parent and single child class derived
from the parent
Multilevel Inheritance
• Class B is derived from class A and
• class C is derived from class B
Multilevel Inheritance
Multiple Inheritance
Phone Camera
Smart Phone
Hierarchical Inheritance
Person
Student Teacher
Full-Time Part-Time
Hybrid Inheritance
• Hybrid inheritance is a combination of two
or more types of inheritance discussed earlier
What inheritance does Java support?
• Java supports single, multi-level, hierarchical
inheritance through classes
• Java doesn’t support Multiple Inheritance (One
sub class deriving from more than one super
classes) through classes but through interfaces
• Hybrid Inheritance is only supported if it’s a
combination of single/multi-level/hierarchical
• Each class is allowed to have one direct
superclass
• Each superclass can have unlimited number
of subclasses
Example 1
• Consider a Mobile Phone Model: Example:
Redmi 9
• If I want to add more features to Redmi 9 to
develop my new model, Redmi 9 Pro, I reuse
the basic design of Redmi 9 and add the
additional features, rather than creating
Redmi 9 Pro from scratch.
• This concept is called Inheritance
• Inheritance facilitates reusability.
How is inheritance achieved in Java?
• Using the extends keyword
class Parent{
….
}
class Child extends Parent{
…
}
Problem Statement 1:
• Consider a class called Shape with member
color of the shape. Consider a class called
Rectangle, derived from the Shape class, which
adds features length and breadth, add a
method to print the rectangle’s details and find
the area of the rectangle. Use appropriate
access modifiers.
Scenario 1: Without Constructors
Shape
private String color
public void setColor(String c); Rectangle
public String getColor();
private float length
private float breadth
color
IS A public void setLength(float l));
public float getLength();
public void setBreadth(float b);
public float getBreadth();
public void setColor()
public String getColo()
Scenario 2: With Constructors
Shape
Rectangle
private String color
private float length
public Shape(); private float breadth
public Shape(String color); color
public void setColor(String c);
public String getColor(); public Rectangle();
public Rectangle(float l,float b);
public void setLength(float l));
IS A public float getLength();
public void setBreadth(float b);
public float getBreadth();
public void setColor()
public String getColor()
Example 2: Constructing a Table
• Consider a class called TableTop. It has
features: color, dimensions of table.
• Let’s say you want to now create Table
objects.
• One way to do this is, since, we already have
TableTop class we can reuse it using
inheritance, add features to it to make the
complete Table.
• Let’s Design it.
Class TableTop Class Table
class TableTop{ class Table extends TableTop{
private float length,breadth; int no_legs;
private String color; float height;
TableTop(){ Table(){
no_legs=4;
length=breadth=1;
height=2.5f;
color="Black"; }
} Table(int nl,float h,float l,float b,String c){
TableTop(float l,float b,String super(l,b,c);
c){ no_legs=nl;
color=c; height=h;
length=l; }
breadth=b; public void print(){
System.out.printf("Area=%.2f\n",area());
}
System.out.println("No. of legs="+no_legs);
public float area(){ System.out.printf("Height=%.2f\n",height);
return length*breadth; System.out.println("Color="+getColor());
} }
public String getColor(){ }
return color;
}
}
Main Class for testing
class TestTable{
public static void main(String []args){
Table t1=new Table(3,4,5,6,"Gray");
t1.print();
Table t2=new Table();
t2.print();
}
}
Constructors in Inheritance
• Constructors are invoked in the order of hierarchy
• While instantiating a sub class, its super class default constructor will
be invoked first, followed by the sub class constructor
• The keyword super can be used to invoke the super class
parameterized constructor instead of the default
• Remember that:
• super() call must occur as the first statement in constructor
• super() call can only be used in a constructor definition
Using super
• The keyword super refers to members of the
super class
• Used when member names of the subclass
hide members by the same name in the super
class
• super.member
• member can be either a method or an instance variable
Thank You
