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From: gudeman@arizona.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc
Subject: Definition of Object Oriented Programming
Message-ID: <1458@megaron.arizona.edu>
Date: Fri, 23-Jan-87 17:06:33 EST
Article-I.D.: megaron.1458
Posted: Fri Jan 23 17:06:33 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 24-Jan-87 11:53:19 EST
Organization: U of Arizona CS Dept, Tucson
Lines: 37


   From: gvcormack@watmum.UUCP (Gordon V. Cormack)
   Subject: Re: Object-Oriented vs. Abstract Data Types
   ...
   7.  I still have not seen a satisfactory definition of O-O.  I am not
       at all sure that one exists.  I think it *is* essentially the
       Simula programming methodology invented 20 years ago by Dahl
       et al.

I have seen at least 3 definitions of objected oriented programming,
most people seem to assume one of the following definitions (or some
combination).

Object Oriented Programming:
	(1) programming in {Smalltalk, Simula, ...}.
	(2) programming in a paradigm in which computation is specified by
	    sending messages to objects.
	(3) programming with data structures that are organized hierarchicly,
	    with inheritance of {methods, operations}

I find (1) uninteresting.  (2) is probably the original meaning of the
term, since it seems most related to the term (*Object* oriented).
(3) seems to be the one preferred by Lisp people (who naturally have
no use for languages that pass messages).  It seems most Smalltalk
programmers use a combination of (2) and (3) with occasional shades of
(1).

Disclaimer of Bias: I'm a C and Icon programmer not an O-O programmer

Disclaimer of Stupidity: This is my first posting with the new
software, If my .signature occurs twice it's because the documentation
is faulty.
					David Gudeman

gudeman@arizona.edu			Department of Computer Science
ihnp4!arizona!gudeman			The University of Arizona
602-621-2858				Tucson, AZ 85721