Abstraction and Encapsulation

Abstraction and encapsulation are opposite sides of the same coin, and essential to good object oriented software design.  Why the, is there a tendency of some programmers to go in exactly the opposite direction?  This trend and its implication is discussed below.

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Brainless Getters & Setters are a Waste

Someone long ago set a pattern that all members should have a getter and setter method.  Some are persuaded that this is OO and this is encapsulation, so a lot of inexperienced programmers do this by default.  But this is a problem.

Public or Private Member Variables?

When is it OK to make member variables public?

Keep It Simple: Factory

Some of our development is done by outside contractors, and they have a long list of “code policies” for producing good code.  I have nothing against such policies in theory, but in practice it leads a lot of unnecessary work, simply because simplistic rules about good code do not always lead to good code.  This post is about an example.