cs205: engineering software

university of virginia fall 2006

Data Abstraction

www.cs.virginia.edu/cs205

David Evans

Managing Complexity
Modularity
Divided problem into procedures Used specifications to separate what from how

A big program can have thousands of procedures

cs205: engineering software

Data Abstraction
We need new data types, not just procedures
Could you implement PS2 without the DirectedGraph type? We could make procedures, but what would you pass to them?

Organize program around abstract data types

cs205: engineering software

Abstract Data Types

Separate what you can do with data from how it is represented Client interacts with data through provided operations according to their specifications Implementation chooses how to represent data and implement its operations
cs205: engineering software

Data Abstraction in Java

A class defines a new data type Use private instance variables to hide the choice of representation
private declarations are only visible inside the class

cs205: engineering software

Up and Down
Clients manipulate an abstract data type by calling its operations (methods and constructors)

clients
Abstract Type Concrete Representation

class implementation The representation of an abstract data type is visible only in the class implementation.
cs205: engineering software

Example: CellState
public class CellState {

// OVERVIEW: A CellState is an immutable // object that represents the state of a cell, // either alive or dead.
static public CellState createAlive()

// EFFECTS: Returns an alive cell state.

static public CellState createDead ()

// EFFECTS: Returns a dead cell state.

public boolean isAlive ()

// EFFECTS: Returns true iff this is alive.

}
cs205: engineering software

Cell State Representation

cs.isAlive ()
clients

CellState Abstract Type Concrete Representation

class implementation

private boolean alive; public boolean isAlive () { return alive; }

cs205: engineering software

Advantages/Disadvantages
- More code to write and maintain - Run-time overhead (time to call method) + Client doesnt need to know about representation + Suppose we want to add more states (e.g., question 2)
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Set Example (ps2)

Set abstract data type: represent a set of objects Operations:
Create an empty set Mathematical set operations: add, contains, size, remove, union

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Type Parameters
We want to have sets of different types of objects How should we declare the Set methods?
public boolean add(?? elem) public boolean contains(?? elem) public ?? choose()
We dont want just one Set datatype. We want different Sets for different element types.
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Generic Datatype
public class Set<T> { ... public boolean add(T el) public T choose() public boolean contains(T el) ... } Note: Java did not support generic

datatypes until version 1.5 (this is why the book doesnt use them)
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cs205: engineering software

Creating Specific Types

public class Set<T> { ... public boolean add(T el) public T choose() public boolean contains(T el) ... }

Set<String>

public class Set<String> { ... public boolean add(String el) public String choose() public boolean contains(String el) ... }
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cs205: engineering software

Abstract Data Type Specifications

Overview: what the type represents
Mutability/Immutability
A Set is a mutable, unbounded set of objects of type T.

Abstract Notation
A typical Set is { x1, , xn }.

Operations: procedural specifications for each operation (public methods and constructors); use the abstract notation introduced in overview.
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Set Specification
public class Set<T> implements Iterable<T>, Collection<T> { OVERVIEW: A Set is a mutable, unbounded set of objects of type T. A typical Set is {x_1, ..., x_n }. public Set() EFFECTS: Initializes this to an empty set: { }. public boolean add(T el) MODIFIES: this EFFECTS: Adds el to the elements of this: thispost = thispre U { el } Returns true iff el was not an element of thispre.
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Components of Data Abstractions

Ways to create objects of the data type
Creators: create new objects of the ADT from parameters of other types Producers: create new objects of the ADT from parameters of the ADT type (and other types)

Ways to observe properties: observers Ways to change properties: mutators

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Set Operations
public class Set<T> implements Iterable<T>, Collection<T> { OVERVIEW: A Set is a mutable, unbounded set of objects of type T. A typical Set is {x_1, ..., x_n }. public Set() EFFECTS: Initializes this to an empty set: { }. public Set(Set<T> s) EFFECTS: Initializes this to a set containing the same elements as the set s (a shallow copy).

public T choose() REQUIRES: this has at least one element EFFECTS: Returns an element of this.
public boolean contains(Object el) EFFECTS: Returns true iff el is an element of this.

public int size() public boolean add(T el) EFFECTS: Returns the number of elements in this. MODIFIES: this EFFECTS: Adds el to the elements of this: public boolean isEmpty() this_post = this_pre U { el } EFFECTS: Returns true iff this has no elements. Returns true iff el was not an element of this_pre.
public void union(Set<T> t) MODIFIES: this EFFECTS: this_post = this_pre U t public boolean remove(Object el) MODIFIES: this EFFECTS: Removes el from this: this_post = this_pre - { el } Returns true iff el is in this_pre

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PS2
Several datatype implementations provided with specifications Client interacts with data type using the methods as described in the specification Client does not know the concrete representation Your code should work correctly with any correct implementation of the specified datatype
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