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Polymorphism can be distinguished by when the implementation is selected: statically (at compile time) or dynamically (at run time, typically via a virtual function). This is known respectively as static dispatch and dynamic dispatch, and the corresponding forms of polymorphism are accordingly called static polymorphism and dynamic polymorphism.
In computer science, dynamic dispatch is the process of selecting which implementation of a polymorphic operation (method or function) to call at run time.It is commonly employed in, and considered a prime characteristic of, object-oriented programming (OOP) languages and systems.
In object-oriented programming such as is often used in C++ and Object Pascal, a virtual function or virtual method is an inheritable and overridable function or method that is dispatched dynamically. Virtual functions are an important part of (runtime) polymorphism in object-oriented programming (OOP). They allow for the execution of target ...
When the program calls the speak function on a Cat reference (which can refer to an instance of Cat, or an instance of HouseCat or Lion), the code must be able to determine which implementation of the function the call should be dispatched to. This depends on the actual class of the object, not the class of the reference to it (Cat).
Multiple dispatch or multimethods is a feature of some programming languages in which a function or method can be dynamically dispatched based on the run-time (dynamic) type or, in the more general case, some other attribute of more than one of its arguments. [1]
In computing, late binding or dynamic linkage [1] —though not an identical process to dynamically linking imported code libraries—is a computer programming mechanism in which the method being called upon an object, or the function being called with arguments, is looked up by name at runtime.
This is done by using traditional polymorphism while also casting the argument to dynamic. [3] The run-time binder will choose the appropriate method overload at run-time. This decision will take into consideration the run-time type of the object instance (polymorphism) as well as the run-time type of the argument.
Method overriding, in object-oriented programming, is a language feature that allows a subclass or child class to provide a specific implementation of a method that is already provided by one of its superclasses or parent classes.