The Basics - Four Pillars of Object Oriented Programming

a. Inheritance
i. (e.g. object triangle inherits from
object shape)
b. Abstraction
i. Expose relevant functions and
hides irrelevant, abstract complexity, a wrapper, private vs
public properties.
c. Polymorphism
i. Many forms, one interface having
many behaviours. Invoke base class in a child class.
d. Encapsulation
i. Methods and functions are
encapsulated in a class.
1. Abstraction
Abstraction is a process of exposing essential features of an entity by hiding the other
irrelevant details. Abstraction mainly reduces complexity and increases efficiency. An
entity can have multiple abstractions.
2. Encapsulation
Encapsulation is the process of putting data and the operations (functions) that can be
performed on that data into a single container called class. Now, any programmer can
use this class without knowing how it is implemented. Due to encapsulation, data is
insulated, thus not directly accessible from the outside world. This is known as Data
Hiding.

Remember, Encapsulation is not data hiding, but, Encapsulation leads to data hiding.
3. Inheritance
In a nutshell, inheritance is a process of creating new class from the existing one. The
new class may have some additional properties and functionalitiy.
4. Polymorphism
Poly means many and Morphs means forms. Polymorphism refers to the ability to take
multiple forms and it allows us to invoke derived class methods through a base class
reference during run-time.