Abstract functions in child classes

[Steven Schveighoffer]

On Thu, 01 Dec 2011 12:58:24 -0500, Regan Heath <regan at netmail.co.nz>  
wrote:

> On Thu, 01 Dec 2011 17:50:48 -0000, Adam <Adam at anizi.com> wrote:
>> Ok, starting to feel like I'm missing something obvious...
>
> This:
>
>      void main() {
>          Child child = new Child;
>      }
>
> also produces the (expected) error.  Basically dmd was letting you get  
> away with the abstract class because you never instantiated it.
>
> Child child;
>
> is just a reference to a Child class.
>
> You could argue the compiler should error in either case, in fact, I  
> would.  But perhaps there is a good generic programming reason not to...  
> someone more experienced might be able to shed some light on it.

A Child reference could be for a further derived GrandChild type that does  
actually implement the required functions.  In fact, Child is also  
abstract, it just isn't required to be marked as such.

All marking a class as abstract does is make it uninstantiable, just like  
having an abstract method does.  However, you can mark a class abstract to  
prevent it from being instantiated, even when none of its methods are  
abstract (could be useful in some situations).

However, I have no idea why you'd mark a concrete function as abstract.   
That seems like a "just because we could" feature.

-Steve