When to use Inheritance in C#?

Hello everyone,

Kindly explain "What is the use of Inheritance? and When to use?" with respect two below programs.

Why I cannot get output from 1st program after using class initialization?

Program 1:

class Program
{
class Shape
{
public void setWidth(int w)
{
width = w;
}
public void setHeight(int h)
{
height = h;
}
public int width;
public int height;
}
// Derived class
class Rectangle
{
Shape objshape = new Shape();
public int getArea()
{
return (objshape.width * objshape.height);
}
}
static void Main(string[] args)
{
Shape Rect = new Shape();
Rectangle objRectangle = new Rectangle();
Rect.setWidth(5);
Rect.setHeight(7);
// Print the area of the object.
Console.WriteLine("Total area: {0}", objRectangle.getArea());
Console.ReadKey();
}
}

Program 2:

class Program
{
class Shape
{
public void setWidth(int w)
{
width = w;
}
public void setHeight(int h)
{
height = h;
}
public int width;
public int height;
}
// Derived class
class Rectangle : Shape
{
public int getArea()
{
return (width * height);
}
}
static void Main(string[] args)
{
Rectangle Rect = new Rectangle();
Rect.setWidth(5);
Rect.setHeight(7);
// Print the area of the object.
Console.WriteLine("Total area: {0}", Rect.getArea());
Console.ReadKey();
}
}

Hi,

Good question...............

One of the key benefits of inheritance is to minimize the amount of duplicate code in an application by sharing common code amongst several subclasses. Where equivalent code exists in two related classes, the hierarchy can usually be refactored to move the common code up to a mutual superclass. This also tends to result in a better organization of code and smaller, simpler compilation units.

Inheritance can also make application code more flexible to change because classes that inherit from a common superclass can be used interchangeably. If the return type of a method is superclass

Reusability -- facility to use public methods of base class without rewriting the same
Extensibility -- extending the base class logic as per business logic of the derived class
Data hiding -- base class can decide to keep some data private so that it cannot be altered by the derived class

Overriding--With inheritance, we will be able to override the methods of the base class so that meaningful implementation of the base class method can be designed in the derived class.

1 Reply

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Bikesh Srivastava10y ago
Accepted answer
Hi,
Good question...............
One of the key benefits of inheritance is to minimize the amount of duplicate code in an application by sharing common code amongst several subclasses. Where equivalent code exists in two related classes, the hierarchy can usually be refactored to move the common code up to a mutual superclass. This also tends to result in a better organization of code and smaller, simpler compilation units.

Inheritance can also make application code more flexible to change because classes that inherit from a common superclass can be used interchangeably. If the return type of a method is superclass

Reusability -- facility to use public methods of base class without rewriting the same
Extensibility -- extending the base class logic as per business logic of the derived class
Data hiding -- base class can decide to keep some data private so that it cannot be altered by the derived class

Overriding--With inheritance, we will be able to override the methods of the base class so that meaningful implementation of the base class method can be designed in the derived class.
+1