Delegation Is Inheritance

Abstract

Inheritance and delegation are alternate methods for incremental definition and sharing. It has commonly been believed that delegation provides a more powerful model. This paper demonstrates that there is a “natural” model of inheritance which captures all of the properties of delegation. Independently, certain constraints on the ability of delegation to capture inheritance are demonstrated. Finally, a new framework which fully captures both delegation and inheritance is outlined, and some of the ramifications of this hybrid model are explored.