8.3 Summary
Objects and their corresponding methods are the building blocks of many of today’s software systems. For all object-oriented programming languages, some objects and methods are predefined, and those are always specified in the language manuals.
In that light, we introduced objects, explained built-in objects, and discussed parameter passing, a mechanism to transfer information in and out of objects.
8.3.1 Key Concepts
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Classes define the characteristics and behaviors of objects belonging to the class.
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Objects are instantiations of a class. They have a name and possess all the properties of the class, namely, the variables and the methods.
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The application user interface, or API, is an interface used to communicate with some underlying functionality.
8.3.2 Key Definitions
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Object: An isolated piece of code that has its own actions and data.
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Method: The action that an object may perform.
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API: An interface provided to the programmer to allow the use of certain functionality without knowing the specifics of the implementation.
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Class: Construct that contains the definition of an object template and the implementation of the methods.
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Parameter passing: The passing of data to a method within an object.
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