prefer composition over inheritance. Can composition sometimes be more flexible or easier to maintain than straight-up inheritance? Sure. prefer composition over inheritance

 
Can composition sometimes be more flexible or easier to maintain than straight-up inheritance? Sureprefer composition over inheritance Author’s Note: PLEASE DONT FORGET TO READ PART 2 – PREFER COMPOSITION OVER INHERITANCE! – It describes the alternative! It’s what the Gang of Four intended when they made Design Patterns

The most basic way to deal with multiple inheritance issues in Java is to use interfaces and then delegate behavior using composition. We prefer composition over inheritance because when we add (particularly) or change functionality by subclassing, we couple that new functionality to the class - so anywhere we need the new functionality, we need that class. js web application, try using the React. While the consensus is that we should favor composition over inheritance whenever possible, there are a few typical use cases where inheritance has its place. What advantages does composition have over inheritance? Coupling and Cohesion Ideally, the objects in our system have high cohesion (i. "Inheritance vs 'specification' by fields. 42. This is a bit of a muse day. Others: 1. Vector. Should composition be favoured over inheritance as rule - in all circumstances? I have read that inheritance is actually now being seen as an anti pattern. A good example where composition would've been a lot better than inheritance is java. Both of them promote code reuse through different approaches. These docs are old and won’t be updated. edited Dec 13, 2022 at 23:03. Another thing to consider when using inheritance is its “Singleness”. (It is not the same as inheritance, either. The input has a name and can come from two sources: a named file or standard input (stdin). In Python. The programming platform empowers developers for. Conclusion. This is where the age-old design pattern of composition over inheritance comes into the picture. So in your case, using composition for attributes like wings and legs makes perfect sense, but Bird, Cat and Dog ARE animals - they don't "have" an animal (well, they all have fleas but that's another topic) - so they should inherit from Animal. 8. There are several other questions like that out there, most of which got negative votes. So, the way I understand "prefer composition over inheritance" is that inheritance leaks an implementation detail. Prefer Composition over Inheritance. Use composition instead implementation inheritance and use polymorphism to create extensible code. And please remember "Prefer composition. It should never be the first option you think of, but there are some design patterns which. Improve this answer. Almost everything else could change. Composition is a about relations between objects of classes. You do multiple inheritance of interface in Java like this: public interface Foo { String getX (); } public interface Bar { String getY (); } public class MultipleInterfaces implements Foo, Bar { private Foo foo; private Bar. 4,984 2 2 gold badges 24 24 silver badges 36 36 bronze badges. Stack, which currently extends java. Additionally, if your types don’t have an “is a” relationship but. you want to express relationship (is-a) then you want to use inheritance. This chapter introduces the 'prefer composition over inheritance' design principle, by explaining the 'Strategy-Pattern'. Be very careful when you use inheritance. ” Scott Oakes said that to me, Reply reply ijgowefk • This can be written more clearly as Prefer interfaces and composition over inheritance As written, it sounds like Pefer composition over. George Gaskin. 2. Actually, "Composition over inheritance" often ends up being "Composition + inheritance over inheritance" since you often want your composed dependency to be an abstract superclass rather than the concrete subclass itself. What composition over inheritance really has to say here is that it would have been nice if JButton has been designed with composition polymorphism so your CutomButton method could have been passed into it. Composition over inheritance (or composite reuse principle) in object-oriented programming (OOP) is the principle that classes should favor polymorphic behavior and code reuse by their composition (by containing instances of other classes that implement the desired functionality) over inheritance from a base or parent class. It’s also reasonable to think that we would want to validate whatever payment details we collect. This is what you need. change to super class break subclass for Inheritance 2. Composition is a about relations between objects of classes. Antipattern: inheritance instead of composition. The way you describe the problem, it sounds like this is a good case for using inheritance. Code dễ đọc và dễ hiểu hơn. class Movement. For above mentioned scenario we prefer composition as PortfolioA has a List and it is not the List type. An interface (the C# keyword kind) is for giving common behavior to unrelated classes and then handle objects polymorphically. Then you have interfaces or (depending on the language) multiple inheritance. Of the three OOP principles, inheritance was probably the second principle that you came to understand after encapsulation. Share. Give the Student class a list of roles, including athlete, band member and student union member. 13 February, 2010. If you want the object to use all the behavior of the base class unless explicitly overridden, then inheritance is the simplest, least verbose, most straightforward way to express it. Composition alone is less powerful than inheritance,. I think above quote easily explains what I. Field: a named property of some type, which may reference another object (see composition) Method: a named function or procedure, with or without parameters, that implements some behavior for a class. Improve this answer. Derived classes do not have access to private members of their base class. In that case, why inheritance is provided as the one of the main concepts. It does not matter if you are using inheritance or composition, you still need to know about the performance hit to design around it. Composition is fairly simple and easy to understand. They are absolutely different. In OO design, a common advice is to prefer composition over inheritance. Improve this answer. Composition: Composition is the technique of creating a new class by combining existing classes. Prefer composition over mixins for complex behaviors: If the desired behavior involves complex composition or multiple interacting components, consider using composition (i. For example, rather than. Composition over inheritance (or composite reuse principle) in object-oriented programming (OOP) is the principle that classes should achieve polymorphic behavior and code reuse by their composition (by containing instances of other classes that implement the desired functionality) rather than inheritance from a base or parent. Improve this answer. e. e. ” Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented. Can composition sometimes be more flexible or easier to maintain than straight-up inheritance? Sure. 1 Answer. It's not that inheritance is broken, only that it's over-used and misused. Should We Really Prefer Composition Over Inheritance? In short? Yes — but not in the way I used to think. Actually, "Composition over inheritance" often ends up being "Composition + inheritance over inheritance" since you often want your composed dependency to be an abstract superclass rather than the concrete subclass itself. Interface-based Inheritance. 0. ApplicationException {} Inheritance lets you create exceptions with more specific, descriptive names in only one line. The rule of thumb is to use inheritance if A is-a B and to use composition if A is-implemented-in-terms-of B. has-a relationship seems having better modularity than is-a relationship. a single responsibility) and low coupling with other objects. THIS POST SERIES ISN’T ABOUT OOP BEING BAD – It’s getting you to realize THE TRUE POWER OF OOP –. Much like other words of wisdom, they had gone in without being properly digested. In this section, we will consider a few problems where developers new to React often reach for. OOP: Inheritance vs. It is but to refactor an inheritance model can be a big waste of time. Abstract classes or interfaces are only useful with inheritance. A Decorator pattern can be used to attach additional responsibilities to an object either statically or dynamically. H2CO3 February 5, 2022, 6:49am 3. Be very careful when you use inheritance. However, inheritance does have its place in software development (there is a reason many design patterns use inheritance). Prefer composition over inheritance; Dependency injection for objects that fullfill defined roles; Cautiously apply inheritance and polymorphism; Extracting classes or objects when appropriate; Tiny public interfaces; Make all member variables private; Avoid global variables at all times;composition นั้นไม่ได้ใช้หรือทำงานร่วมกับ inheritance. Inheritance is more rigid as most languages do not allow you to derive from more than one type. As the Gang of Four (probably) said: favor object composition over class inheritance. e. Normally I prefer composition over inheritance, but given that this ensures a consistent set of IDs and allows for a common stream for a limited number of types, I'm not too sure why it wouldn't. - Wikipedia. Composition makes your code far more extensible and readable than inheritance ever would. You can easily create a mock object of composed class for the sake of testing. These days, one of the most common software engineering principle did dawn on me. Prefer composition over inheritance. Prefer composition over inheritance? Have a look at the example in this documentation link: The example shows different use cases of overriding by using inheritance as a mean to achieve polymorphism. Single inheritance rules out using inheritance for "has-a" relationships like those in the cars example above. Your observation about the matrix of classes you'd have when using inheritance is also on point, and can probably be thought of as a code smell pointing toward composition. My problem with that is that some relationships logically fit into inheritance i. . The big advantage is that it doesn't require delegation to. When books and articles refer to "prefer composition over inheritance", they are specifically not talking about interfaces; they're talking about state and behaviour inherited from a base class. It becomes handy when you must subclass different times in ways that are orthogonal with one another. In the same way, the. For example, a stack is not a vector, so Stack should not extend Vector. For example, many widgets that have a text field accept any Widget, rather than a Text widget. A good example where composition would've been a lot better than inheritance is java. Every single open source GUI toolkit however uses inheritance for the drawn widgets (windows, labels, frames, buttons, etc). What you can do is to make a new GameObject and . In this interview, Erich Gamma, co-author of the landmark book, Design Patterns, talks with Bill Venners about two design principles: program to an interface, not an implementation, and favor object composition over class inheritance. 1. Composition over inheritance (or composite reuse principle) in object-oriented programming (OOP) is the principle that classes should favor polymorphic behavior and code reuse by their composition (by containing instances of other classes that implement the desired functionality) over inheritance from a base or parent class. avoids vtable-based dynamic dispatch when the number of trait implementations is small and known in advance. Though, 1st we need to consider the purpose of inheritance – acquiring common characteristics and behavior, this is useful for building a hierarchy (mentioned interface-like classes also), trees. Composition makes your code far more extensible and readable than inheritance ever would. 1)Inheritance is strongly coupled where as composition is loosely coupled 2) Inheritance is compile time determined where as composition is run-time 3)Inheritance breaks encapsulation where as composition. Additionally, if your types don’t have an “is a” relationship but. Teach. In any case, describing a sentence prefixed with the word 'prefer' as 'pithy' seems out of place. You should prefer inheritance when inheritance is more appropriate, but prefer composition when composition is more appropriate. I'll show you my favorite example: public class LoginFailure : System. #include <vector> class B { // incomplete B private: std::vector<int> related_data; }; So naturally, we would maybe start reaching for inheritance at this. The biggest point of confusion and contention seems to be composition versus inheritance, often summarized in the mantra “favor composition over. That's all about the point. In some languages or projects, you'll prefer a common class to inherit from, than a dozen functions to import and call, but in React, mainly because it's component-centric approach, the oposite is true. If you say class Human: public Eye in C++, and then the singularity arrives and we all see with bionic implants, class Human: public BionicImplant is an API change, since you can no longer get an Eye pointer from a Human. 5. Classes and objects created through inheritance are tightly coupled, changing the parent (or superclass) in an inheritance relationship can cause unwanted side effects on the subclass. In this blog post, I attempt to summarize what I’ve. Both of them promote code reuse through different approaches. This. แต่ในความเป็นจริง. It gives a code example of inheritance first, and then a code example of composition. Although it is not suited to all software designs there are situations where it is difficult to deny it's utility over interfaces, composition and similar OO techniques. Here you will see why. Let’s take a single design problem and watch how this principle works itself out through several of the classic Gang of Four design patterns. Reply. That is, when both options are viable, composition is more flexible down the line. Generally it is said, Favor Composition Over Inheritance, as it offers many advantages. But you'll need to decide case by case. This principle is a reaction to the excessive use of inheritance when Object Oriented design became popular and inheritance of 4 or more levels deep were used and without a proper, strong, "is-a" relationship between the levels. single inheritance). g 1. You still get code reuse and polymorphism through it. . Personally I do have a good grasp of understanding this principle, as well as the concepts around it. Also, when you change a class, it may have unexpected side-effects on inheriting objects. That is why the age old OOP adage of "prefer composition over inheritance" exists. In languages without multiple inheritance (Java, C#, Visual Basic. If The new class is more or less as the original class. + Composition & delegation: a commonly-used pattern to avoid the problems of subclassing. Share. Each design pattern will assemble simple classes, unburdened by inheritance, into an elegant runtime solution. Single inheritance rules out using inheritance for "has-a" relationships like those in the cars example above. That extends even to further subclasses - and with Java's single-inheritance model, if we have two new bits of. ”. Favor composition over inheritance is one of the popular object-oriented design principles, which helps to create flexible and maintainable code in Java and other. In the implementation of this pattern, we prefer composition over an inheritance - so that we can reduce the overhead of subclassing again and again for each. In this section, we will consider a few problems where developers new to React often reach for. “Favor composition over inheritance” is a design principle that suggests it’s better to compose objects to achieve polymorphic behavior and code reuse rather than inheriting from a base class. Unlike interfaces, you can reuse code from the parent class in the child class. I generally agree with UnholySheep's comment that you should prefer composition over inheritance because this generally makes your code more modular. Favor object composition over class inheritance. If you're working in a language without multiple inheritance, you should always favour composition over inheritance. I learnt one way to achieve polymorphism is through inheritance, if object A and B has a "is-a" relationship. One more name -- can be good or bad. But again, virtually all of the major design patterns use composition, and modern design paradigms such as inversion of control and dependency injection also use composition. In Java, this means that we should more often define interfaces and. These are just a few of the most commonly used patterns. Composition vs. A seminal book. Mỗi cách thiết kế đều có ưu nhược điểm riêng, chúng ta cần xác định rõ mục đich, và. In this article, we learned the fundamentals of inheritance and composition in Java, and we explored in depth the differences between the two types of relationships (“is-a” vs. From Effective Java 2nd Edition, Item 16: Favor composition over inheritance: There are a number of obvious violations of this principle in the Java platform libraries. Cars and trucks both have steering and acceleration, but a truck isn't a car, and shouldn't inherit behavior from it just because some of the implementation is shared. Composition over inheritance! A lot of times developers look at principles like SOLID and forget the basic Composition over inheritance principle. Inheritance: a class may inherit - use by default - the fields and methods of its superclass. Almost everything else could change. IMHO "prefer composition over inheritance" is such a misunderstood thing it's become a dogma. I had previously heard of the phrase “prefer composition over inheritance”. Inheritance is more rigid as most languages do not allow you to derive from more than one type. I am acquainted with the "prefer composition over inheritance" rule of thumb but at the beginning of the example it made sense to. Identify Components and Group them in Logical LayersWhy prefer composition instead of inheritance? What trade-offs have there for jede approaching? And the converse question: when should I choose inheritance instead of composition? Stack Overflow. So let’s define the below interfaces: When I first learned object-oriented programming, I saw inheritance as a useful way for objects to share functionality. Composition Over Inheritance. Despite my discomfort, I had to find a solution which led me to design patterns. If inherited is a class template itself, sometimes need to write this->a to. Inheritance: a class may inherit - use by default - the fields and methods of its superclass. As a very general rule, look no further than The Zen of Python (which you can also see by typing import this into the Python interpreter): Flat is better than nested. Eugene. Composition makes change easier because the functionality sits in the place you expect. That only means inheritance should be handled with care because it comes at a cost, not that it isn't useful. NET Prefer Composition Over Inheritance is an important tenet of Object oriented programming, but what's so bad about. Now that you know about inheritance, you may feel ready to conquer the world. However, there are cases where inheritance is a more suitable choice, such as when you need to define shared behavior or override base class methods. It enables you to combine simple objects to achieve more complex behavior without the need to create intricate inheritance hierarchies. " What benefits was it giving you in this case? I would avoid blindly following "prefer composition over inheritance" like it's gospel. Inheritance: “is a. This advice tends to apply to game logic structures, when the way in which you can assemble complex things (at runtime) can lead to a lot of different combinations; that's when we prefer composition. In object-oriented programming, we will often handle this with inheritance. If we look into bridge design pattern with example, it will be easy to understand. In case of inheritance there are data that are present in form of the model field. The point is, to simply put, always consider composition first before you inheriting a class, if both can do the job, prefer composition over inheritance. It is generally recommended to use composition over inheritance. Prefer Composition Over Inheritance Out of Control Inheritance. Inheritance is a way of reusing existing code and creating hierarchies of classes that share common features. Overview. Composition is still an OOP concept. enum_dispatch is a crate that implements a very specific optimization, i. In both cases, do the classes have a strict "is-a" relationship? If you can say "Has-a" out loud and it doesn't sound stupid, you probably want composition. Why you should favor composition over inheritance. OOP allows objects to have relationships with each other, like inheritance and aggregation. Share. In the another side, the principle of inheritance is different. Let's say you wanted to avoid they use of abstract classes completely and only use concrete classes. Basically it is too complicated and intertwined. attr_of_{a,b} gives you an attribute of A or B too (same caveat as with methods). "X inherits Y" implies that "X is a Y", so it can be useful in cases where that statement is technically true (for example, "a square is a rectangle"). 6. a = 5; // one less name. You can easily create a mock object of composed class for the sake of testing. Composition: Composition is the technique of creating a new class by combining existing classes. That only means inheritance should be handled with care because it comes at a cost, not that it isn't useful. "Prefer composition over inheritance" isn't just a slogan, it's a good idea. Pros: Allows polymorphic behavior. Composition in JavaScript is implemented through concatenative. This applies also to modeling in MPS. 5. Composition has always had some advantages over inheritance. In most cases, you should prefer composition when you design plain Java classes. 21 votes, 31 comments. Of course, if you have many generic. It is only possible when the class that one wants to inherit from implements an interface. This comprehensive article navigates the complex discussion of composition vs inheritance in the context of ReactJS programming. React has a powerful composition model, and we recommend using composition instead of inheritance to reuse code between components. Similarly, a property list is not a hash table, so. 2. None provides association. We need to include the composed object and use it in every single class. Now we want to add a second class, which is a 'specialisation' of A but has additional data which relates to the data in A. Usually it implies the opposite. Use aggregation. Don’t use is or similar checks to act differently based on the type of the child. You should use interfaces instead of having a class hierarchy. 🚨 IMPORTANT:1 Year Free Hosting: code KYLE for an additional $50Object oriented programming has been around for. When an object of a class assembles objects from other classes in that way, it is called composition. It's an existential type: a concrete static type. If you can justify the relationship in both directions, then you should not use inheritance between them. Composition is a “has-a” relationship, used to design a class on what it does. use interface segregation for the type you refer to, in order not to have a dependency on something you shouldn't need to care about. Inheritance. Now the Flutter language dev team has been pretty clear that composition should always be prefered to inheritance when extending widgets. Even more misleading: the "composition" used in the general OO. Finally, it depends on the language used. answered Jan 2, 2009 at 5:18. 2: Repository Pattern. I don't know if this influenced the design of Swing, but it's a big concern for collection classes. What are the various "Build action" settings in Visual Studio project properties and what do they do? Sep 28, 2008. This might mislead to think that there is a relation between these two different concepts: Inheritance is about a relation between classes. util. Code reusebility: Các lớp con có các properties và functions của lớp cha -> Có thể giảm sự duplicate code giữa các lớp con bằng cách đặt các phần code bị duplicate vào lớp cha. The strategy pattern is all about encapsulating or wrapping up a behavior or algorithm in it’s own class. With composition, it's easy to change behavior on the fly with Dependency Injection / Setters. An often-repeated piece of advice in OOP is “prefer composition over inheritance”. Think more carefully about what constitutes a more specific class. How this method is implemented, whether by composition, generics or some other technique, is orthogonal. Moreover, abusing of inheritance increase the risk of multiple inheritance. But inheritance has. When you use composition, you are (as the other answers note) making a "has-a" relationship. If we would to find a comparison with real world, we could also take a house as an example. You are able to switch moving. Yes, (novice) developers need to be urged away from overusing inheritance, but that does not invalidate that there are use cases for inheritance. Prefer composition over inheritance? 1242 What is the difference between public, private, and protected inheritance? 83 How do I implement a trait I don't own for a type I don't own? Related questions. Why to prefer object composition over inheritance. It was first coined by GoF. Some reasons: The number of classes increases the complexity of the codebase. It was difficult to add new behaviour via inheritance since the. Mar 26, 2012 at 17:37. Publish the abstraction interface in the separate inheritance hierarchy, and put the implementation in its own inheritance hierarchy. Composition at least you can freely refactor if you need to. You need to be precise: Java allows multiple inheritance of interface, but only single inheritance of implementation. Prefer composition over inheritance. Follow. In that respect, there is not necessarily a single best way to achieve a result, and it's up to you to compare the pros and cons. And dealing with high inheritance trees is complexity. Mantras Considered Harmful As a heuristic, ‘favor composition over inheritance’ is okay, however, I am not a fan of mantras. Inheritance. Prefer composition over inheritance as it is more malleable / easy to modify later, but do not use a compose-always approach. Your composition strategy still involves inheritance with virtual methods, so that really doesn't simplify over the (first) direct inheritance option. Publish abstraction interface in a separate inheritance hierarchy, and put the implementation in its own inheritance hierarchy. Prefer composition over inheritance? 1 How To Make. composition over inheritance; Random bits. E. First, justify the relationship between the derived class and its base. In this article, I discussed why you should prefer composition over inheritance, looked at the repository and DTO patterns, and compared two options for initializing lazily fetched associations in the business layer to avoid the Open Session in View anti-pattern. Composition is flexible. Assume that you have started a project and you decided to use VIPER as project architecture. We need to include the composed object and use it in every single class. Composition is a "has-a". “has-a”). In the world of Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) you may have heard the statement 'favour composition over inheritance'. The phrase means that, when appropriate,. In OO, if something "is a" use inheritance. How can we refactor "inheritance code reuse" into composition and still be able to keep a polymorphic approach?. Prefer composition over inheritance if you do not need to inherit. Prefer composition over inheritance. This way, different responsibilities are nicely split into different objects owned by their parent object. Goを勉強している中で、「Composition over inheritance」という概念が出てきました。ちゃんと理解していなかったので、ここで改めて掘り下げます。 ちゃんと理解していなかったので、ここで改めて掘り下げます。 Communicating clearly with future programmers, including future you. Prefer composition over inheritance as it is more malleable / easy to modify later, but do not use a compose-always approach. The sentence is directed towards. ”. Reference. At first, it provided dynamic polymorphism. Concerning;19. method_of_B() calls the method of B if it isn't overridden somewhere in the MRO (which can happen with single inheritance too!), and similarly for methods of A. Inheritance does not break encapsulation. Prefer composition over mixins for complex behaviors: If the desired behavior involves complex composition or multiple interacting components, consider using composition (i. Strategy Pattern. Inheritance vs. People will repeat it without even understanding it. Why prefer composition instead of heirship? What trade-offs are there required each approach? And the converse question: when ought I choose inheritance instead of composition? Stack Overflow. 1. IS-A relation ship represents inheritances and HAS-A relation ship represents composition. In general composition is the one you want to reach for if you don’t have a strong. In fact "Prefer composition over inheritance" is right only for classes not designed for inheritance. Use bridge. In short: Composition is about the relationship of class and object. Composition keeps React about just two things: props and state. Your abstract class is designed for inheritance : it is abstract and has an abstract method. With composition, it's easy to change. When people say prefer composition over inheritance, they are referring to class inheritance. Better Test-Ability: Composition offers better test-ability of class than inheritance. Many developers find comfort in defining an abstract class with common code implemented as virtual in base class. It also gives the developer more power over how this progress bar works. The sentence is directed towards people at stage 2 in the hype cycle, who think inheritance should be used everywhere. As you know, each layer in the viper module has an interface. Inheritance, composition, delegation, and traits. In this interview, Erich Gamma, co-author of the landmark book, Design Patterns, talks with Bill Venners about two design principles: program to an interface, not an implementation, and favor object composition over class inheritance. util. Prefer composition to inheritance. In this case, MasterChecker (correctly) composes the various concrete checkers, as your advice recommended. Composition is still an OOP concept. That is something we hear over and over again when programming in the object-oriented world, whether it is Java, C♯, JavaScript, it is a concept that is widely spoken of but is never fully understood. If your friend thinks that "favour composition over inheritance" is a mantra for avoiding inheritance altogether, he is mistaken and doesn't understand the concept of a complete toolset. Favor object composition over class inheritance. As discussed in other answers multiple inheritance can be simulated using interfaces and composition, at the expense of having to write a lot of boilerplate code. The first thing to remember is that inheritance tightly bounds you to the base class. Composition has always had some advantages over inheritance. Given that the SOLID principles offer more maintainability and extensibility to your project, I'd prefer interfaces over inheritance. The new class has now the original class as a member. Teach. As such it's a MUCH worse role than the simple "has a versus is a" separation. But inheritance comes with some unhappy strings attached. My question is about your experience on a common problem about code readability in complex domain problems like calculation that inheritance can decrease readability. I prefer to opt-in things to expose as opposed to opt-out. e. e. Let’s see some of the reasons that will help you in choosing composition vs inheritance. Composition vs Inheritance. 1969 Prefer composition over inheritance? 1242. ‍ 9. 2. Inheritance is used at its best, when its used to force some features down to its subclasses. When you establish an. In many newer languages, inheritance is limited to one class, while you can compose as much as you want. I do not agree with you. There are still cases where inheritance makes the most sense. In the world of Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) you may have heard the statement 'favour composition over inheritance'. The main difference between inheritance and composition is in the relationship between objects. Inheritance doesn’t have this luxury. What advantages does composition have over inheritance? Coupling and Cohesion Ideally, the objects in our system have high cohesion (i. Each design pattern will assemble simple classes, unburdened by inheritance, into an elegant runtime solution. The subclass uses only a portion of the methods of the superclass. As such it's a MUCH worse role than the simple "has a versus is a" separation. Compasition is when a class has an instance of another class. With composition, it's easy to change behavior on the fly with Dependency Injection / Setters.