The Structure of the Exam

• For all topics, you should be able to trace, analyze, and write Java code.
  • Questions will for the most part consist of:
    • presenting you with a piece of code and asking you what is output — or what the value of one or more variables are — once the code is executed
    • presenting you with a problem decription and asking you to write the corresponding code
    • asking you what is wrong with a piece of code and/or asking you to repair it
    • presenting you with a piece of code and asking you to trace the value of one or more variables as the code is executed
• Although you will not be asked for definitions of terms, you should know them as they will be used in the text of the questions.
• A substantial portion of the exam will be based on the assigned exercises/labs and lecture code.
• While the book is a good supplement, you are only responsible for topics and material in the lecture notes and the CodeLab exercises / labs / projects. These are a great way for you to prepare yourself for the exam.

The exam is cumulative, but focuses on Lectures 3-5 (Exception-Handling, Interfaces, Class Inheritance). Here is a detailed breakdown of the topics

Exception Handling>

• Alternatives to exception-handling: guardian methods, overloaded (trailer) return values, result objects
• Throwing, catching exceptions
• try/catch blocks

Interfaces

• Syntax, semantics, and purpose of an interface
• Implementing classes
• programming to the interface vs programming to the implementation/class
• Coding interface-level 'demo' apps
• Interface inheritance

Class Inheritance

• Independent implementation vs composition vs inheritance
  • is-a vs has-a
• Superclasses (parent) /subclasses (child)
  • Syntax, semantics, and purpose of inheritance
• protected data access
• up/downcasting
• overriding methods
  • vs overloading (compile-time polymorphism)
• superclass initialization

Polymorphism

• Rule of Polymorphism: method resolution is based on the (runtime/dynamic) type of the object and not the (static/compile-time) type of the receiver reference variable.

Abstract Classes and Methods

• Syntax, semantics, and purpose of an abstract class
• Skeletal class implementing part of an interface

And of course all CodeLab exercises, Labs, and Lecture code

• Labs 3-5