Relationships among

Classes
Java™ How to Program, 10/e
Late Objects Version

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References & Reading
 The content is mainly selected (sometimes modified)
from the original slides provided by the authors of the
textbook

 Readings
 Chapter 8: Classes and Objects: A Deeper Look
 Chapter 9: Object-Oriented Programming: Inheritance

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Outline
8.8 Composition
9.1 Introduction
9.2 Superclasses and Subclasses
9.3 protected Members
9.4 Relationship Between Superclasses and Subclasses
9.5 Constructors in Subclasses
9.6 Class Object

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8.8 Composition
 A class can have references to objects of other classes
as members.
 This is called composition and is sometimes referred to

as a has-a relationship.
 The following example presents a class Date (Fig.

8.7), a class Employee (Fig. 8.8) that has 2 Dates,

and a class EmployeeTest (Fig. 8.9) to demonstrate
the composition.
 UML representation of Composition:

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 Date
- month: int
- day: int
- year: int
<<constructor>> Date(month: int, day: int, year : int)
+ toString() : String

Employee
- firstName : String
- lastName : String
- birthDate : Date
- hireDate: Date
<<constructor>> Employee(firstName: String, lastName: String, birthDate : Date, hireDate: Date)
+ toString() : String
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9.1 Introduction
 Inheritance
 A new class (subclass) is created by acquiring an existing
class’s (superclass) members and possibly embellishing them
with new or modified capabilities.
 Can save time during program development by basing new
classes on existing proven and debugged high-quality software.
 Increases the likelihood that a system will be implemented and
maintained effectively.
 Java supports only single inheritance, in which each class is
derived from exactly one direct superclass.
 The Inheritance is sometimes referred to as a is-a
relationship.
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9.1 Introduction (Cont.)
 A subclass can be a superclass of future subclasses.
 A subclass can add its own fields and methods (becomes
more specific than its superclass)
 The direct superclass is the superclass from which the
subclass explicitly inherits.
 An indirect superclass is any class above the direct
superclass in the class hierarchy.
 The Java class hierarchy begins with class Object (in
package java.lang)
 Every class in Java directly or indirectly extends (or “inherits
from”) Object.

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9.2 Superclasses and Subclasses
 Figure 9.1 lists several simple examples of superclasses
and subclasses
 Superclasses tend to be “more general” and subclasses “more
specific.”

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9.2 Superclasses and Subclasses
(Cont.)
 A superclass exists in a hierarchical relationship with its
subclasses.
 Fig. 9.2 shows a sample university community class hierarchy
 Also called an inheritance hierarchy.
 Each arrow in the hierarchy represents an is-a relationship.
 Follow the arrows upward in the class hierarchy
 “an Employee is a CommunityMember”
 “a Teacher is a Faculty member.”
 CommunityMember is the direct superclass of Employee,
Student and Alumnus, and is an indirect superclass of all the
other classes in the diagram.

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9.2 Superclasses and Subclasses
(Cont.)
 Objects of all classes that extend a common superclass
can be treated as objects of that superclass.
 Commonality expressed in the members of the superclass.
 Inheritance issue
 All members of all superclasses are inherited (except private)
 A subclass can inherit methods that it does not need or should
not have.
 Even when a superclass method is appropriate for a subclass,
that subclass often needs a customized version of the method.
 The subclass can override (redefine) the superclass method
with an appropriate implementation.

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9.3 protected Members
 A class’s public members are accessible wherever the
program has a reference to an object of that class or one of
its subclasses.
 A superclass’s private members are accessible only
within the class itself but they are hidden from its subclasses
(can be accessed only through the public or protected
methods inherited from the superclass)
 protected access is an intermediate level of access
between public and private.
 A superclass’s protected members can be accessed by members
of that superclass, by members of its subclasses and by members of
other classes in the same package
 All public and protected superclass members retain their
original access modifier when they become members of the subclass.
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9.3 protected Members (Cont.)
 Subclass methods can refer to public and protected
members inherited from the superclass simply by using the
member names.
 When a subclass method overrides an inherited superclass
method, the superclass version of the method can be
accessed from the subclass by preceding the superclass
method name with keyword super and a dot (.) separator.

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9.4.1 Creating and Using a
CommissionEmployee Class (Cont.)
 Class CommissionEmployee (Fig. 9.10) extends
implicitly class Object (from package java.lang).
 CommissionEmployee inherits Object’s methods.
 If you don’t explicitly specify which class a new class extends,
the class extends Object implicitly.
 Constructors are not inherited.
 The first task of a subclass constructor is to call its

direct superclass’s constructor explicitly (super) or

implicitly
 If the code does not include an explicit call to the

superclass constructor, Java implicitly calls the

superclass’s default or no-argument constructor.
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9.4.1 Creating and Using a
CommissionEmployee Class (Cont.)
 toString is one of the methods that every class
inherits directly or indirectly from class Object.
 Returns a String representing an object.
 Called implicitly whenever an object must be converted to a
String representation.
 Class Object’s toString method returns a
String that includes the name of the object’s class.
 This is primarily a placeholder that can be overridden by a
subclass to specify an appropriate String representation.

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9.4.1 Creating and Using a
CommissionEmployee Class (Cont.)
 To override a superclass method, a subclass must
declare a method with the same signature as the
superclass method
 The optional @Override annotation

 Indicates/ensures that a method should override a superclass

method with the same signature.
 If it does not, a compilation error occurs.
 The CommissionEmployee class overrides
Object’s toString method

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9.4.1 Creating and Using a
CommissionEmployee Class (Cont.)
Changing inherited method access modifier
 A subclass can change the access modifier of an

inherited method
 It is a compilation error to override a method with a

more restricted access modifier

 A public superclass method cannot become a protected or
private subclass method
 A protected superclass method cannot become a private
subclass method

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9.4.3 Creating a CommissionEmployee–
BasePlusCommissionEmployee Inheritance Hierarchy

 Class BasePlusCommissionEmployee class extends

class CommissionEmployee
 A BasePlusCommissionEmployee object is a
CommissionEmployee
 Inheritance passes on class CommissionEmployee’s capabilities.
 Class BasePlusCommissionEmployee also has
instance variable baseSalary.
 Subclass BasePlusCommissionEmployee inherits
CommissionEmployee’s instance variables and methods
 Only CommissionEmployee’s public and protected
members are directly accessible in the subclass.

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9.4.3 Creating a CommissionEmployee–
BasePlusCommissionEmployee Inheritance Hierarchy
(Cont.)
 Each subclass constructor must implicitly or explicitly call
one of its superclass’s constructors to initialize the instance
variables inherited from the superclass.
 Superclass constructor call syntax—keyword super, followed by a
set of parentheses containing the superclass constructor arguments.
 Must be the first statement in the constructor’s body.
 If the subclass constructor did not invoke the superclass’s
constructor explicitly, the compiler would attempt to insert a
call to the superclass’s default or no-argument constructor.
 Class CommissionEmployee does not have such a constructor,
so the compiler would issue an error.
 You can explicitly use super() to call the superclass’s no-
argument or default constructor, but this is rarely done.
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9.4.5 CommissionEmployee–BasePlus-
CommissionEmployee Inheritance Hierarchy
Using private Instance Variables
 Methods earnings and toString each invoke

their superclass versions and do not access instance

variab
 Method earnings overrides class the superclass’s
earnings method.
 Calls superclass’s earnings method with
super.earnings().
 Obtains the earnings based on commission alone
 Placing the keyword super and a dot (.) separator
before the superclass method name invokes the
superclass version of an overridden method.

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9.4.5 CommissionEmployee–BasePlus-
CommissionEmployee Inheritance Hierarchy
Using private Instance Variables (Cont.)
 BasePlusCommissionEmployee’s toString

method overrides class CommissionEmployee’s

toString method.
 It creates part of the String representation by calling

CommissionEmployee’s toString method with

the expression super.toString().

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9.5 Constructors in Subclasses
 Instantiating a subclass object begins a chain of constructor
calls
 The subclass constructor, before performing its own tasks, explicitly
uses super to call one of the constructors in its direct superclass or
implicitly calls the superclass’s default or no-argument constructor
 If the superclass is derived from another class, the
superclass constructor invokes the constructor of the next
class up the hierarchy, and so on.
 The last constructor called in the chain is always Object’s
constructor.
 Original subclass constructor’s body finishes executing last.

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 ConstructorChainTest.java
run:
Create new instance of A:
=> Constructor A
Create new instance of B:
=> Constructor A
=> Constructor B
Create new instance of C:
=> Constructor A
=> Constructor B
=> Constructor C
Extra slides

Abeer alsheddi – extra slides

 Superclasses and Subclasses
 Types of inheritance are supported in java

https://www.onlyjavatech.com/inheritance-in-java/:Reference

Abeer alsheddi – extra slides 43

 Superclasses and Subclasses (Cont.)
 Types of Inheritance are not supported in java.

https://www.onlyjavatech.com/inheritance-in-java/:Reference

Abeer alsheddi – extra slides 44

Constructors in Subclasses
 Problem:
 When a super-class has an argument constructor.
 Because:
 Creating any object of subclass will (by default)
invoke a default constructor of a super-class.
 Solutions:
 At super-class: Add a default constructor.
OR
 At subclass: Call explicitly an argument constructor
of its direct super-class using super() in the first
statement in a subclass constructor.

Abeer alsheddi – extra slide 45

Self-Reading

46
9.6 Class Object
 All classes in Java inherit directly or indirectly from class
Object, so its 11 methods are inherited by all other classes.
 Figure 9.12 summarizes Object’s methods.
 Every array has an overridden clone method that copies the
array.
 If the array stores references to objects, the objects are not copied—a
shallow copy is performed.

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