{"id":77024,"date":"2020-03-03T11:31:08","date_gmt":"2020-03-03T06:01:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/techvidvan.com\/tutorials\/?p=77024"},"modified":"2020-03-03T11:31:08","modified_gmt":"2020-03-03T06:01:08","slug":"java-encapsulation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/techvidvan.com\/tutorials\/java-encapsulation\/","title":{"rendered":"Java Encapsulation – Master the Concept with Real-life Examples"},"content":{"rendered":"

The most adopted and popular programming language approach, structured programming approach, failed to show the desired results in terms of bug-free, easy-to-maintain, and reusable programs.<\/p>\n

The programming approach, Object-Oriented approach (OOP), offers a new and powerful way to cope with this complexity. The approach of OOP is based on various concepts that help achieve its goal to overcome the drawbacks of structured programming approaches.<\/p>\n

This article will introduce you to one of the most fundamental concepts in OOP that is Encapsulation in Java.<\/p>\n

Moving forth in this article, we are going to learn in detail about –<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. What is Java Encapsulation?<\/li>\n
  2. Encapsulation in the Real-World<\/li>\n
  3. Encapsulation- A way to implement Abstraction<\/li>\n
  4. Achieving Encapsulation in Java<\/li>\n
  5. Advantages of Java Encapsulation<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    What is Java Encapsulation?<\/h3>\n

    Encapsulation is one of the most powerful and fundamental concepts of Object-Oriented Programming. Encapsulation, in general, is the action of enclosing or binding something. In OOP, it is a way of combining both data and functions that operate on that data, into a single unit.<\/p>\n

    In other words, we can define it as Encapsulation<\/strong> is the wrapping up of data and functions (methods that operate on the data) into a single unit (called class).<\/p>\n

    There is a prohibition for direct access to the data. Functions (that combine with the data) are the only way to access data. These functions are the member functions or methods in Java. It basically creates a shield due to which the code or data cannot be accessed outside the shield.<\/p>\n

    If you want to read data items in an object, you call the member function in the object. It will read the data item from the function and return the value to you. You can\u2019t access the data directly using the object. The data is hidden, so it is kept protected and safe from accidental alteration.<\/p>\n

    Data and its methods are said to be encapsulated into a single entity.<\/p>\n

    Get to know more about Java Methods<\/a> in detail with Techvidvan.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

    The following figure shows the illustration of the approach of Encapsulation:<\/p>\n

    \"Java<\/a><\/p>\n

    Encapsulation in the Real-world<\/h3>\n

    Let us now consider the analogy to encapsulation in the real-world. In a large organization, there are so many departments like Sales, Accounts, Payroll<\/a>, Purchase, Production, etc. Each department has its own personnel or staff that maintain its data.<\/p>\n

    Suppose an employee of the Production department wants to know the quantity of raw material that has been purchased for the next month. The employee would not be allowed to go through the data files of the Purchase dept.<\/p>\n

    Rather he will have to issue a memo to the \u2018Purchase\u2019 department requesting for the required information. Then some employees of the Purchase dept will go through the data files of Purchase and send the reply with the asked information.<\/p>\n

    This practice ensures that the users access the data accurately and the unexpert outsiders do not corrupt this data. Therefore we can say that the \u2018data and employees\u2019<\/strong> of the department encapsulate together into a single entity, the Department.<\/p>\n

    Similarly, objects provide an approach to program organization while helping to maintain the integrity of the program data.<\/p>\n

    Encapsulation – A way to implement Abstraction<\/h3>\n

    With the help of Encapsulation, we can apply data abstraction. Encapsulation hides the implementation details of the object.<\/p>\n

    We can often achieve Encapsulation through data\/information hiding. Data\/Information hiding is the process of hiding all the unessential characteristics of an object and showing only the necessary details.<\/p>\n

    The structure of the object, as well as the implementation of its methods, are invisible to users.<\/p>\n

    In the above example of the department, the essential information of the departments is visible that is dept-name, dept-head, number-of-employees, etc. The secret information which is not essential is not visible that is dept-profit\/loss, stock, etc.<\/p>\n

    This information is available only if there request through a proper channel example, issuing a memo, etc.<\/p>\n

    \"Java<\/a><\/p>\n

    Achieving Encapsulation in Java<\/h3>\n

    In order to achieve encapsulation in Java, we have to \u2212<\/p>\n