OO's best feature survey results

From: Topmind (topmind_at_technologist.com)
Date: 10/26/03

  • Next message: Doc O'Leary: "Re: Visitor, dynamic_cast or ..." 
    Date: 25 Oct 2003 22:42:10 -0700

    This is from an informal poll taken at www.c2.com (OoBestFeaturePoll),
    a Wiki "board" for software engineering topics built by an OO
    consultancy. The number in parentheses is the number of votes. Note
    that it is easy to fudge votes, so this is far from scientific or
    secure. But, it paints an interesting picture. I am surprised
    "encapsulation" got so many votes. I don't see it claimed that often
    in debates. (A separate section was created to clarify what was liked
    about encapsulation, but so far there has not been very many
    responses.)

    But I am not surprised that "models human thinking" scored so high,
    because the preference for OO seems subjective I have come to
    conclude. Many people dig it simply because it naturally fits the way
    *they* think. The lack of clear-cut external evidence for OO
    betterment, such as reduced lines of code or less "change points", is
    another reason why I tentatively conclude this. 

    ----
What do you consider the most important benefit or claim of OO
technology or OOP?
    * Reuse (5)
    * Better models the external world (2)
    * Better models human thinking (13)
    * Easier to change existing OO code (8)
    * Easier to design good interfaces (4)
    * Encapsulation (13) see below
    * Polymorphism (6)
    * More type-checking options/ability (0)
    * You just like it (2)
    * OO sucks, see no benefits (1)
    * OO mostly sucks, see benefits in limited domains/situations (9)
    * Helps lots of people work in parallel (2)
    * Chicks dig OO (1)
    * Studs dig OO (0)
    * OO sucks, but other language paradigms suck more (2)
    * Other (5)
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-T-
  • Next message: Doc O'Leary: "Re: Visitor, dynamic_cast or ..."