What is an abstract class?

You create an abstract class when you want to manipulate a set of classes through this common interface. All derived-class methods that match the signature of the base-class declaration will be called using the dynamic binding mechanism.
A class containing abstract methods is called an abstract class. Class does not contain implementation for Abstract methods. If a class contains one or more abstract methods, the class itself must be qualified as abstract. (Otherwise, the compiler gives you an error message.)

November 3, 2008 | Filed Under Java