Welcome to the Treehouse Community

Want to collaborate on code errors? Have bugs you need feedback on? Looking for an extra set of eyes on your latest project? Get support with fellow developers, designers, and programmers of all backgrounds and skill levels here with the Treehouse Community! While you're at it, check out some resources Treehouse students have shared here.

Looking to learn something new?

Treehouse offers a seven day free trial for new students. Get access to thousands of hours of content and join thousands of Treehouse students and alumni in the community today.

Start your free trial

Java

When do we need downcasting actually?

I am starting to figure out how to use downcasting in java object, but i don't know when should I include downcasting in my program and why ?

1 Answer

The main use I see is that instead of having to create methods to handle every object type you can use the same method for all the objects in the class hierarchy. This is because the compiler only checks the Reference type when it compiles the code but since the object doesn't change it will pull the subclass method instead of the super class'. Hope that helped.