Objectives

This section gives an introduction to the Eiffel language. It discusses the design principles underlying Eiffel, which may be characterized as being focused on static typing and support for the development of reliable programs. It gives an overview of the keywords related to the constructs offered, and discusses type expressions, value expressions and control statements. An example is given to illustrate the features offered. We conclude by looking at the mechanisms of renaming and redefining, which are needed to avoid name clashes when using multiple inheritance.

Points to emphasize

Comments

The assertion logic supported by Eiffel is a simple boolean logic, similar to that which may be used in conditionals. An important feature of Eiffel, not discussed in this introduction, is the use of exceptions to deal with errors and the violation of conditions. Exceptions are triggered when, for example, a pre-condition is not satisfied. An object may resume the execution when the exception clause includes a retry statement.