Hands-On Design Patterns with C++

Inheritance and class hierarchies

Class hierarchies in C++ serve a dual purpose. On the one hand, they allow us to express relations between objects. On the other hand, they let us compose more complex types from simpler ones. Both uses are accomplished through inheritance.

The concept of inheritance is central to the C++ use of classes and objects. Inheritance allows us to define new classes as extensions of existing ones. When a derived class is inherited from the base class, it contains, in some form, all of the data and the algorithms that were in the base class, and it adds some of its own. In C++, it's important to distinguish between two primary types of inheritance—public and private.

Public inheritance inherits the public interface ...