Editing Skeleton (computer programming) (section)

=== Polymorphism-based definitions ===
[[Polymorphism (computer science)|Polymorphism]] is an ideology that follows with the [[object-oriented programming]] paradigm, where methods can be overridden or [[Overloaded method|overloaded]] (methods with the same name in a child class which will take priority over a method written in a parent class). The definition of methods is based on a skeleton framework defined by the [[syntax]] of the language.<ref>{{Citation|last1=Benaya|first1=Tamar|url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-69924-8_15|pages=161–170|place=Berlin, Heidelberg|publisher=Springer Berlin Heidelberg|isbn=978-3-540-69923-1|access-date=2020-11-18|last2=Zur|first2=Ela|title=Informatics Education - Supporting Computational Thinking |chapter=Understanding Object Oriented Programming Concepts in an Advanced Programming Course |series=Lecture Notes in Computer Science |year=2008 |volume=5090 |doi=10.1007/978-3-540-69924-8_15 |url-access=subscription}}</ref>

Very similar to class implementation, skeleton code can be used to define the methods that are part of an [[Interface (computing)|interface]]. An interface is essentially a [[blueprint]] of a class, which allows for strict object oriented languages (such as [[Java (programming language)|Java]]) to use classes from different [[Java package|packages]] without the need to fully understand the internal functions. Interfaces simply define the methods that have to be present within the class, allowing anyone else to use the methods or implement the class for their personal needs
<syntaxhighlight lang="java">
public skeletonExample();
</syntaxhighlight>

An [[abstract class]] is almost the same as a class implementation, however depending on the language, at least one method is defined as abstract. This implies that any children of this class (any classes that extend or implement) need to have a method defined for this. Abstract classes have a very similar definition style to interfaces, however a keyword ‘abstract’ is typically used to identify the fact that it needs to be implemented in child classes.
<syntaxhighlight lang="java">
public abstract skeletonExample();
</syntaxhighlight>

These examples use the [[Java syntax]].