Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
An interface in the Java programming language is an abstract type that is used to declare a behavior that classes must implement. They are similar to protocols.Interfaces are declared using the interface keyword, and may only contain method signature and constant declarations (variable declarations that are declared to be both static and final).
For example, in Java, the Comparable interface specifies a method compareTo() which implementing classes must implement. This means that a sorting method, for example, can sort a collection of any objects of types which implement the Comparable interface, without having to know anything about the inner nature of the class (except that two of ...
[7] [8] interface Used to declare an interface that only contains abstract or default methods, constant (static final) fields and static interfaces. It can later be implemented by classes that declare the interface with the implements keyword. As multiple inheritance is not allowed in Java, interfaces are used to circumvent it. An interface can ...
Collection implementations in pre-JDK 1.2 versions of the Java platform included few data structure classes, but did not contain a collections framework. [4] The standard methods for grouping Java objects were via the array, the Vector, and the Hashtable classes, which unfortunately were not easy to extend, and did not implement a standard member interface.
Java SE 8 introduced default methods to interfaces which allows developers to add new methods to existing interfaces without breaking compatibility with the classes already implementing the interface. Unlike regular interface methods, default methods have a body which will get called in the case if the implementing class doesn't override it.
The use of interfaces to allow disparate teams to collaborate raises the question of how interface changes happen in interface-based programming. The problem is that if an interface is changed, e.g. by adding a new method, old code written to implement the interface will no longer compile – and in the case of dynamically loaded or linked plugins, will either fail to load or link, or crash at ...
Get AOL Mail for FREE! Manage your email like never before with travel, photo & document views. Personalize your inbox with themes & tabs. You've Got Mail!
All parameterized types share the same interface at runtime. A method is generic if it declares one or more type variables. [8] These type variables are known as the formal type parameters of the method. The form of the formal type parameter list is identical to a type parameter list of a class or interface.