Overriding Methods and Inheritance in Java

This section will explain the code listed in the previous section. The class "Person" is defined with the following members:

• name
  
• setName
  
• getDetails

The class "Lecturer" is defined with the following members:

• qualification
  
• getDetails

As the class "Lecturer" is inherited from "Person," it virtually contains the following members:

• name
  
• setName
  
• getDetails
  
• qualification

You must note that "getDetails" is available in both super and sub classes. From the class "Lecturer" point of view, it considers its own local method "getDetails," rather than the class "Person."  Now, if we proceed to our "test" frame, we have the following initially:

        Person p1 = new Person("Jag");
        Lecturer l1 = new Lecturer("Chat", "M.Sc.");

The above will create two objects, "p1" (of class "Person") and "l1" (of class "Lecturer").  We call the method "getDetails" from both of those objects and display the information on the form using the following lines:

        this.lblMsg.setText(p1.getDetails());
        this.lblMsg2.setText(l1.getDetails());

In the case of "p1.getDetails," it executes the method "getDetails," which belongs to the class "Person." In the later case of "l1.getDetails," it executes the method "getDetails," which belongs to the class "Lecturer."  Make sure that it doesn't execute the method "getDetails" which is available in the "Person" class from the "Lecturer" object.

That means the method "getDetails" in the "Lecturer" class is given more preference than "getDetails" in the "Person" class for any "Lecturer" object.  This is what is called overriding the methods.