History and Advantages of Object Oriented Design
History of Object Oriented Design
The history of Object-Oriented Design (OOD) can be traced back to the 1960s. Here’s an overview of the key milestones in the history of OOD:
1. Early Concepts (1960s):
– Object-Oriented Design (OOD) finds its roots in early work on simulation and modeling, where computer scientists explored concepts like “object-oriented simulation” to represent real-world systems as interacting objects.
2. Simula (1967):
– Simula, developed by Ole-Johan Dahl and Kristen Nygaard at the Norwegian Computing Center in Oslo, was the first programming language to support object-oriented programming. It introduced the concept of classes and objects.
3. Smalltalk (1970s):
– In the 1970s, Alan Kay and his team at Xerox PARC pioneered Smalltalk, a programming language often regarded as one of the first pure object-oriented programming languages.
4. Object-Oriented Programming Languages (1970s – 1980s):
– During the subsequent years, numerous object-oriented programming languages were developed, including C++, Eiffel, and Objective-C.
5. Object-Oriented Analysis and Design Methodologies (1980s):
– In the 1980s, the focus shifted beyond programming languages, leading to the emergence of methodologies for analyzing and designing software using object-oriented principles. Methodologies like the Booch method and OMT (Object Modeling Technique) gained prominence.
6. Unified Modeling Language (UML) (1990s):
– Grady Booch, James Rumbaugh, and Ivar Jacobson collaborated in the early 1990s to create the Unified Modeling Language (UML), which became a standardized graphical notation for visualizing, specifying, and documenting various aspects of software systems.
7. Widespread Adoption (1990s – 2000s):
– From the 1990s onwards, object-oriented programming and design became the dominant paradigm for building complex software systems, mainly due to its benefits in code organization, reusability, and maintainability.
8. Design Patterns (1990s – 2000s):
– During this period, design patterns became widely recognized for offering common solutions to recurring design problems in OOD.
9. Modern Frameworks and Libraries (2000s – Present):
– As the internet and web development surged, OOD principles were applied to create modern frameworks and libraries for various programming languages. Frameworks like Ruby on Rails (for Ruby) and Django (for Python) adopted OOD principles to facilitate rapid development.
Throughout its history, Object-Oriented Design has continually evolved. Today, OOD remains a fundamental and widely-used approach in software engineering.
Advantages of Object Oriented Design
Object-Oriented Design (OOD) provides numerous advantages that enhance the development of robust and easily maintainable software applications. Some of the key benefits it offers are:
1. Simplification through Abstraction
Another advantage of Object-Oriented Design is abstraction and simplification. Through abstraction, OOD enables developers to concentrate on the fundamental characteristics and behaviors of objects, concealing unnecessary implementation details. This simplification of the design aids in managing complexity
2. Modularity
One of the benefits of Object-Oriented Design is its emphasis on modularity. OOD promotes dividing complex systems into smaller, self-contained modules or classes, where each class defines a specific object with well-defined behaviors. This approach fosters code reusability. As a result, development time and effort are reduced.
3. Code Reusability through Inheritance
Object-Oriented Design also leverages inheritance for code reuse. Inheritance permits classes to inherit properties and behaviors from other classes. By utilizing inheritance, developers can reuse code effectively, leading to a well-structured and organized class hierarchy.
4. Maintainability and Extensibility
OOD places significant focus on maintainability and extensibility. This approach results in code that is more straightforward to modify, and extend. The advantage of such a design is that changes made to one part of the code are less likely to impact other areas,. Therefore it will simplify the process of maintaining and updating the software over time.
5. Real-World Mapping
Another advantage of Object-Oriented Design is its capability to model software systems based on real-world entities and relationships. This approach makes the design more closely related with the problem domain. As a result, developers can better understand the system.
6. Improved Collaboration and Teamwork
Object-Oriented Design fosters enhanced collaboration among developers and teams by advocating the division of complex projects into smaller, manageable tasks. These tasks can be assigned to different developers or teams, promoting parallel development.
