Question

I was reading about creating classes and nested classes to determine what is the best approach for my needs, but I couldn’t find something similar to what I need ( or couldn’t understand it 😉 ).

I will give you guys a (almost) real-life example:

Let’s say I own a factory which manufactures different kinds of vehicles. So, my namespace would be Factory I figure.

Now, lets say the factory manufactures cars, boats and airplanes. So I will add three classes to my Factory namespace with those names.

Here is where my problem is with understanding the other methods:

I have some common things between the three types of vehicles. For example, they all have an engine (might be different HP or shapes which I understand are properties of the engine, but still they all have an engine). Also, cars and airplanes have doors (sometimes boats do too). On the other hand, they also have some unique things (airplanes have propellers for example that might come in different sizes or shapes).

Can someone please describe what I said in code so I could understand the differences between them?

Answer 1

You could stick all these in your Factory namespace.

A vehicle class would contain shared components, and classes for your specific vehicle types would inherit from the vehicle class… is that what you’re asking?

public class Engine
{
   public int HorsePower {get;set;}
}

public class Vehicle
{
    public Vehicle() { }

    public Engine Engine;
    public int Doors;
}

public class Airplane : Vehicle
{
    public Airplane () { }

    public string PropellerModel;
}

public class Boat : Vehicle
{
    public Boat () { }

    public string RudderModel;
}