What is "object-oriented programming"

alt. (context programming English) A programming paradigm that uses "objects" to design applications and computer programs. Abbreviation: OOP. n. (context programming English) A programming paradigm that uses "objects" to design applications and computer programs. Abbreviation: OOP.

Object-oriented programming (OOP) is a programming paradigm based on the concept of " objects", which may contain data, in the form of fields, often known as attributes; and code, in the form of procedures, often known as methods. A feature of objects is that an object's procedures can access and often modify the data fields of the object with which they are associated (objects have a notion of " this" or "self"). In OOP, computer programs are designed by making them out of objects that interact with one another. There is significant diversity of OOP languages, but the most popular ones are class-based, meaning that objects are instances of classes, which typically also determine their type.

Many of the most widely used programming languages are multi-paradigm programming languages that support object-oriented programming to a greater or lesser degree, typically in combination with imperative, procedural programming. Significant object-oriented languages include Java, C++, C#, Python, PHP, Ruby, Perl, Delphi, Objective-C, Swift, Common Lisp, and Smalltalk.