[Tutor] processing a text file w/ OO?

[Alan Gauld]

> I'm processing a tab-delimited text file where I read in a file,  
> perform a bunch of operations on the items, and then write them out  
> again to a fixed-width text file.
> 
> I've been doing this with a very functional approach:
> 
> Anyway, this all works fine. Not knowing much about OO, I'm wondering  
> if there's a way to approach this from an object-oriented  
> perspective. Is there anything to be gained? Or is this type of  
> problem best tackled with a functional approach?

This is one of the types of problem where I personally don't try to use 
objects too much. Where objects might be helpful is if you have a number 
of similar but slightly different data records such that the processing 
consists of lots of if/elif chains. In that case identifying the type once 
and relying on polymorphism to deal with the differences is useful. 
But if the records all have similar processing then OOP will make the 
code bulkier, slower and not add too much IMHO.

OTOH if you were to write a lot of these kinds of applications OOP 
might provide a higher level of code reuse between projects.... 
But remember that the cost of reuse means that you need to reuse 
code 3(*) or more times to make it economical!

(*) Metrics suggest the actual figure varies between 3-10 times depending 
on language, object complexity and level of generality.

HTH,

Alan G
Author of the learn to program web tutor
http://www.freenetpages.co.uk/hp/alan.gauld