When Objects Are Alike
In the programming world, duplicate code is considered evil. We should not have multiple copies of the same, or similar, code in different places. When we fix a bug in one copy and fail to fix the same bug in another copy, we've caused no end of problems for ourselves.
There are many ways to merge pieces of code or objects that have a similar functionality. In this chapter, we'll be covering the most famous object-oriented principle: inheritance. As discussed in Chapter 1, Object-Oriented Design, inheritance allows us to create "is-a" relationships between two or more classes, abstracting common logic into superclasses and extending the superclass with specific details in each subclass. In particular, we'll be covering the Python syntax and principles for the following:
- Basic inheritance
- Inheriting from built-in types
- Multiple inheritance
- Polymorphism and duck typing
This chapter&apos...