C++ Coding Standards: 101 Rules, Guidelines, and Best Practices

64. Blend static and dynamic polymorphism judiciously

Summary

So much more than a mere sum of parts: Static and dynamic polymorphism are complementary. Understand their tradeoffs, use each for what it’s best at, and mix them to get the best of both worlds.

Discussion

Dynamic polymorphism comes in the form of classes with virtual functions and instances manipulated indirectly (through pointers or references). Static polymorphism involves template classes and template functions.

Polymorphism means that a given value can have more than one type, and a given function can accept arguments of types other than the exact types of its parameters. “Polymorphism is a way of gaining some of the freedom of dynamic type checking without giving up the benefits ...