We live in a world of objects. These objects exist in nature, in humanmadeentities, in business, and in the products that we use. They can ...
We live in a world of objects. These objects exist in nature, in humanmadeentities, in business, and in the products that we use. They can be categorized, described, organized, combined, manipulated, and created. Therefore, it is no surprise that an object-oriented view would be proposed for the creation of computer software—an abstraction that enables us to model the world in ways that help us to better understand and navigate it.
An object-oriented approach to the development of software was first proposed in the late 1960s. However, it took almost 20 years for object technologies to become widely used. Throughout the 1990s, object-oriented software engineering became the paradigm of choice for many software product builders and a growing number of information systems and engineering professionals. As time passes, object technologies are replacing classical software development approaches. An important question is why?
The answer (like many answers to questions about software engineering) is not a simple one. Some people would argue that software professionals simply yearned for a “new” approach, but that view is overly simplistic. Object technologies do lead to a number of inherent benefits that provide advantage at both the management and technical levels.
Object technologies lead to reuse, and reuse (of program components) leads to faster software development and higher-quality programs. Object-oriented software is easier to maintain because its structure is inherently decoupled. This leads to fewer side effects when changes have to be made and less frustration for the software engineer and the customer. In addition, object-oriented systems are easier to adapt and easier to scale (i.e., large systems can be created by assembling reusable subsystems)
