Creating a Subclass

Article
05/18/2015

Applies To: Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R3, Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2, Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 Feature Pack, Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012

Subclasses are classes that extend (inherit from) other classes. In X++, a new class can only extend one other class; multiple inheritance is not supported. If you extend a class, it inherits all the methods and variables in the parent class (the superclass).

Subclasses enable you to reuse existing code for a more specific purpose, saving time on design, development, and testing. To customize the behavior of the superclass, override the methods in your subclass.

For terminology, a superclass is often called a base class, and a subclass is often called a derived class.

For more information about overriding a method, see Overriding a Method.

Example

The following example creates a class called Point and extends it to create a new class called ThreePoint.

    class Point
    {
        // Instance fields.
        real x; 
        real y; 
        ;
     
        // Constructor to initialize fields x and y.
        new(real _x, real _y)
        { 
            x = _x;
            y = _y;
        }
    }
     
    class ThreePoint extends Point
    {
        // Additional instance fields z. Fields x and y are inherited.
        real z; 
        ;
    
        // Constructor is overridden to initialize z.
        new(real _x, real _y, real _z)
        {
            // Initialize the fields.
            super(_x, _y); 
            z = _z;
        }
    }

Preventing Class Extension

You can prevent classes from being extended by using the final modifier:

public final class Attribute
{
int objectField;
}

Creating a Subclass

Example

Preventing Class Extension

See also

Additional resources