ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the computer science concepts. These include the concepts embedded in object-oriented systems, and some that are associated with knowledge representation and conceptual modeling. The fundamental idea in object-oriented programming deals with the extension of the concept of type. The development of types in early languages was intuitive, dealing with REAL, INTEGER, CHAR, and BOOLEAN data formats built into the hardware of a computer's central processor operating codes. The data structures within an object carry data that describe an object instance. A basic notion in object-oriented systems that goes beyond abstract data type is inheritance. Inheritance allows new object definitions to be based on existing ones; a new object type can be defined by referring to an existing object type and adding the differences between the referenced type and the new one. Polymorphism applies to both single and multiple inheritance languages. Specialization is the conceptual term for "inheritance" or the "is-a" relation.
