Problems of Inheritance at Java Inner Class

TL;DR

This paper discusses inheritance issues in Java inner classes, highlighting how they can reintroduce multiple inheritance problems and proposing a measure to evaluate these potential issues.

Contribution

It exposes inheritance problems specific to Java inner classes and introduces a measure to assess their potential inheritance conflicts.

Findings

Inner classes can cause inheritance problems similar to multiple inheritance.

Deeper inner class nesting increases inheritance complexity.

A measure is proposed to evaluate inheritance risks in Java inner classes.

Abstract

Single inheritance has been widely accepted in the current programming practice to avoid the complication that incurred by multiple inheritance. Single inheritance enhances the reusability of codes and eliminates the confusion of identical methods that possibly defined in two superclasses. However, the mechanism of inner class in Java potentially reintroduces the problems encountered by multiple inheritance. When the depth of Java inner class is increased, the problem becomes severe. This paper aims at exposing the problems of inheritance at the Java inner class. In addition, a measure is proposed to evaluate the potential problem of inheritance for Java inner class