[opengoop] Inheritance Nomenclature

[Jim K. <ji...@ji...>]

Hello all,

For describing inheritance, OOP has many nomenclatures.  For example:

parent class - superclass (smalltalk), base class (C++), and ancestor =
class

child class - subclass (smalltalk), derived class (C++), and descendant
class

For OpenGOOP Inheritance, I think that we should adopt a single
nomenclature.  We should consider the fact that G programmers often do =
not
come from a CS background (I don't :-) and so I favor the parent/child =
and
ancestor/descendent nomenclatures, rather than those of C++ and =
smalltalk.
In fact, usage of parent/child and ancestor/descendant nomenclatures are =
not
mutually exclusive, since parent, grandparent, greatgrandparent, etc. =
are
specific ancestors, and child, grandchild, and greatgrandchild are =
specific
descendents.

I propose that we adopt the parent/child and ancestor/descendant
nomenclatures for OpenGOOP Inheritance.

Any thoughts?

-Jim