Overview

In Part 1 we started with the C# programming language so that we could focus on programs as instructions. When we started Part 2, we switched to C/C++ so that we could focus on programs as organised code. We did this because C# does not include the code structures we needed to explore. Now that we are starting Part 3 we understand how code and data can be organised in the computer, and we want to focus on object-oriented programming concepts.

We have a start with the base mechanics of object-oriented programming from the Member Functions chapter. In Part 3, the focus is more on the concepts and how they work, rather than on the code and how it works. However, we need to use a programming language to help us see these concepts in action.

As we have seen, the C++ language does provide object-oriented programming features. However, C++ will require you to focus on lower level ideas around how these structures are organised in memory. So we should consider which language to use to explore these ideas.

Going forward, we have chosen to switch back to C# as the primary language. However, we will also include other languages to help highlight things as we go.

In this chapter we will focus on the minimal concepts you need to pick up with C#, and other languages, before we really start to focus on objects and object-oriented programming. Then in the next chapter we will re-introduce the other programming concepts we covered in C/C++ across Part 2, but in the new object-oriented way of thinking (paradigm).