Object Oriented Programming
Class Relationships and Class Members
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Inter-Class Relationships
▪ Classes do not live alone. They work together using different types of
Relationships. The strength of a class relationship is based on how
dependent the classes involved are on each other.
▪ Two classes that are strongly dependent on one another are said to
be tightly coupled; changes to one class will most likely affect the other
class.
▪ Tight coupling is usually, but not always, a bad thing; therefore, the
stronger the relationship, the more careful you need to be.
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Inter-Class Relationship Types
Weaker Class Relationship Stronger Class Relationship
Dependency Association Aggregation Composition Inheritance
“depends-on” “uses” “has-a” “contains” “is-a”
When objects of When objects of When one class When one class When one class is
one class work one class work owns but share a contains objects of a type another
briefly with objects with another class reference to another class class
of another class for some objects of another
prolonged time class
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Dependency
▪ A dependency is a relationship between two or more objects
in which an object depends on a 3rd party objects for its
implementation.
▪ For example, receiving 3rd party objects as parameters in a
method. If one of these 3rd party objects change, the other
object can be impacted.
▪ We do not show all dependencies on a class diagram.
Instead only show relevant dependencies.
▪ Course object is not stored as a field in CourseSchedule
object. Only its the methods use Course as a parameter.
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Association
▪ Whenever two objects are related
which each other the relationship is
called as an association.
▪ Therefore when one object is
changed the other is affected,
therefore it is also a dependency but
much stronger.
▪ The key here is, references to
associated object is stored as a field
in the other object class.
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Aggregation
▪ Aggregation is much stronger type of association.
▪ If you could use the words "part-of" or "has-a" to
describe the relationship between two classes then
that relationship is an aggregation.
▪ The “part” object can have a lifecycle which is wider
than its “whole” object, therefore if you destroy the
whole object, the part object is not necessarily
destroyed.
▪ In this example, books will remain even when the
library is dissolved.
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Composition
▪ Composition is more stronger type of aggregation.
▪ It is also like aggregation a whole-part relationship
which can be described using the words
“contains” or “entirely made of”.
▪ The key difference in composition is the part
objects cannot have an independent life cycle,
they live and die with the whole object.
▪ In this example, if the book is removed the its
chapters also should be destroyed.
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Inheritance
▪ As we discussed previously this is a relationship
between classes which can be described using the
words “is-a” or “is-a kind of”.
▪ The class which is described as “is-a” becomes the
child class which derives its features from the other
class which is called the base class.
▪ Although this has strongest dependency it adds to
extensibility and reusability.
▪ In the example here, the SavingsAccount “is-a” a
BankAccount.
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A Class is a 3-Compartment Box
▪ A class contains 3 components:
A Class is a 3-Compartment Box
encapsulating Data and Functions
▪ Class name (or identifier): identifies the class.
▪ Data Members or Variables (attributes, states, fields):
contains the static attributes of the class.
▪ Member Functions (methods, behaviours, operations):
contains the dynamic operations of the class.
▪ A class encapsulates the static attributes (data) and
dynamic behaviours (operations that operate on the data)
in a box.
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Accessors & Mutators
▪ Mutator (Setter) : a member function that stores a value
in a private a member variable, or changes its value in
some way. (e.g. setLength, setWidth )
▪ Accessor (Getter) : a member function that retrieves a
value from a private member variable. They usually
return the value of the private data member, alternatively
they can print it also. (e.g. getLength, getWidth )
▪ Since accessors do not change object’s data, they can
be ended with const keyword in the header to force
them not do any change.
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Class Example in C++
Data Members
Mutators
Member
Functions
Accessors
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Constructors
▪ A constructor is a special member function which has the same name as the
class name.
▪ Constructors are called when a new object of a class is created and their role to
initialize the new object.
▪ Constructor have no return value, not even void.
▪ Types of Constructors :
1. Default : constructor with no parameters
2. Parameterized : constructors with parameters
3. Copy : constructor with reference to same type object as a parameter
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Destructors
▪ A destructor is also a special member function which has the same name as the
class name with a prefix ~.
▪ Destructors role is to properly destroy the object. A destructor that does nothing is
automatically added by the compiler.
Constructors
Destructor
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Lesson Summary
▪ Inter-class Relationships
▪ Dependency & Association
▪ Aggregation & Composition
▪ Inheritance
▪ Class Components
▪ Data Members and Member Functions
▪ Accessors and Mutators
▪ Constructors and Destructors
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