«

I have some inheritance in my classes
I have Administrator class and a Accounts class then inherit from the Staff
class, which in turn inherits from the Person class

I have a function that finds out if the user is a administrator or in
accounts and returns the correct object, I do not know what that will be so
I can not declare the object accounts or administrator, I have to declare it
as a Person or a Staff object like

dim oUser as Person = getUser(userId)
or
dim oUser as Staff = getUser(userId)

either will work of cause, but I wondering if their was a cost, and if you
should always take the base class or as high up in inheritance as you can.

Thanks

It is best to use the most specific class possible in your declaration,
because it means less converting will be involved, as well as leaving less
room for error. In your case, it sounds like this would be the Staff class.
However, for what you are doing I might suggest adding a property to the
Staff class (maybe named "Position" or "Department" or "Title"), and then in
the Administrator and Accounts classes, either set that property in the
constructor or override it so that it returns the desired value. Hopefully
this helps.
--
Nathan Sokalski

http://www.nathansokalski.com/

"ThatsIT.net.au" <me@work> wrote in message
news:30F1DCEC-7FF7-45A1-A912-...
>I have some inheritance in my classes
> I have Administrator class and a Accounts class then inherit from the
> Staff class, which in turn inherits from the Person class
>
> I have a function that finds out if the user is a administrator or in
> accounts and returns the correct object, I do not know what that will be
> so I can not declare the object accounts or administrator, I have to
> declare it as a Person or a Staff object like
>
> dim oUser as Person = getUser(userId)
> or
> dim oUser as Staff = getUser(userId)
>
> either will work of cause, but I wondering if their was a cost, and if you
> should always take the base class or as high up in inheritance as you can.
>
> Thanks

The reason I ask is that when I set it as Person the base class, it does so
no problems, but when I set it as Staff more specific, it tells me strict
does not allow implicit conversion and I need to use CType.

"Nathan Sokalski" <> wrote in message
news:...
> It is best to use the most specific class possible in your declaration,
> because it means less converting will be involved, as well as leaving less
> room for error. In your case, it sounds like this would be the Staff
> class. However, for what you are doing I might suggest adding a property
> to the Staff class (maybe named "Position" or "Department" or "Title"),
> and then in the Administrator and Accounts classes, either set that
> property in the constructor or override it so that it returns the desired
> value. Hopefully this helps.
> --
> Nathan Sokalski
>
> http://www.nathansokalski.com/
>
> "ThatsIT.net.au" <me@work> wrote in message
> news:30F1DCEC-7FF7-45A1-A912-...
>>I have some inheritance in my classes
>> I have Administrator class and a Accounts class then inherit from the
>> Staff class, which in turn inherits from the Person class
>>
>> I have a function that finds out if the user is a administrator or in
>> accounts and returns the correct object, I do not know what that will be
>> so I can not declare the object accounts or administrator, I have to
>> declare it as a Person or a Staff object like
>>
>> dim oUser as Person = getUser(userId)
>> or
>> dim oUser as Staff = getUser(userId)
>>
>> either will work of cause, but I wondering if their was a cost, and if
>> you should always take the base class or as high up in inheritance as you
>> can.
>>
>> Thanks
>
>

Could you post the signatures of all the classes?
--
Nathan Sokalski

http://www.nathansokalski.com/

"ThatsIT.net.au" <me@work> wrote in message
news:85020369-0FAB-4814-9400-...
> The reason I ask is that when I set it as Person the base class, it does
> so no problems, but when I set it as Staff more specific, it tells me
> strict does not allow implicit conversion and I need to use CType.
>
> "Nathan Sokalski" <> wrote in message
> news:...
>> It is best to use the most specific class possible in your declaration,
>> because it means less converting will be involved, as well as leaving
>> less room for error. In your case, it sounds like this would be the Staff
>> class. However, for what you are doing I might suggest adding a property
>> to the Staff class (maybe named "Position" or "Department" or "Title"),
>> and then in the Administrator and Accounts classes, either set that
>> property in the constructor or override it so that it returns the desired
>> value. Hopefully this helps.
>> --
>> Nathan Sokalski
>>
>> http://www.nathansokalski.com/
>>
>> "ThatsIT.net.au" <me@work> wrote in message
>> news:30F1DCEC-7FF7-45A1-A912-...
>>>I have some inheritance in my classes
>>> I have Administrator class and a Accounts class then inherit from the
>>> Staff class, which in turn inherits from the Person class
>>>
>>> I have a function that finds out if the user is a administrator or in
>>> accounts and returns the correct object, I do not know what that will be
>>> so I can not declare the object accounts or administrator, I have to
>>> declare it as a Person or a Staff object like
>>>
>>> dim oUser as Person = getUser(userId)
>>> or
>>> dim oUser as Staff = getUser(userId)
>>>
>>> either will work of cause, but I wondering if their was a cost, and if
>>> you should always take the base class or as high up in inheritance as
>>> you can.
>>>
>>> Thanks
>>
>>
>

well that was with a test class, I re-created then and its no longer asking
for cType, not sure why it was before.



"Nathan Sokalski" <> wrote in message
news:%...
> Could you post the signatures of all the classes?
> --
> Nathan Sokalski
>
> http://www.nathansokalski.com/
>
> "ThatsIT.net.au" <me@work> wrote in message
> news:85020369-0FAB-4814-9400-...
>> The reason I ask is that when I set it as Person the base class, it does
>> so no problems, but when I set it as Staff more specific, it tells me
>> strict does not allow implicit conversion and I need to use CType.
>>
>> "Nathan Sokalski" <> wrote in message
>> news:...
>>> It is best to use the most specific class possible in your declaration,
>>> because it means less converting will be involved, as well as leaving
>>> less room for error. In your case, it sounds like this would be the
>>> Staff class. However, for what you are doing I might suggest adding a
>>> property to the Staff class (maybe named "Position" or "Department" or
>>> "Title"), and then in the Administrator and Accounts classes, either set
>>> that property in the constructor or override it so that it returns the
>>> desired value. Hopefully this helps.
>>> --
>>> Nathan Sokalski
>>>
>>> http://www.nathansokalski.com/
>>>
>>> "ThatsIT.net.au" <me@work> wrote in message
>>> news:30F1DCEC-7FF7-45A1-A912-...
>>>>I have some inheritance in my classes
>>>> I have Administrator class and a Accounts class then inherit from the
>>>> Staff class, which in turn inherits from the Person class
>>>>
>>>> I have a function that finds out if the user is a administrator or in
>>>> accounts and returns the correct object, I do not know what that will
>>>> be so I can not declare the object accounts or administrator, I have to
>>>> declare it as a Person or a Staff object like
>>>>
>>>> dim oUser as Person = getUser(userId)
>>>> or
>>>> dim oUser as Staff = getUser(userId)
>>>>
>>>> either will work of cause, but I wondering if their was a cost, and if
>>>> you should always take the base class or as high up in inheritance as
>>>> you can.
>>>>
>>>> Thanks
>>>
>>>
>>
>
>