Data Modeling 1

You’ve seen how objects combine state and behavior, and how we can construct them and protect their private state. In this lesson we’ll put all of those capabilities to use in modeling a real-world entity! After all, that’s one of the things that objects are for…

Two-Dimensional Array Warmup

Two-Dimensional Array Warmup

First, as a warm-up, let’s construct the imperative logic that we need to check the board. We’ll then use this later in our solution!

Tic-Tac-Toe

Tic-Tac-Toe

As our example we’ll model a game of tic-tac-toe. Whenever we model something using a Kotlin class, we want to consider:

• What does it store? This will guide our design of the object instance variables.
• What does it do? This will guide our design of the object instance methods.

Note that frequently these considerations overlap. We may need to add state to support some action that we realize that we want our class to support. But, anyway, we’ll get there. Let’s get started!

Class Name

Class Name

But before we can even start designing our class, we need to choose a name! That’s not as simple as it sounds! Frequently deciding on a name can encourage you to give some initial productive consideration to exactly what it is that you’re modeling…

Object State

Object State

First, let’s think about what a class modeling a tic-tac-toe game needs to store. Let’s work through that together and begin designing our classes instance variables:

Object Methods

Object Methods

With an initial set of instance variables, let’s think through various things that we want our game model to be able to do. This is not a complete list! You may have other ideas of what to add:

• Let players add a mark to the board
• Check the board after each move to see if the game is over
• Ensure that players take turns correctly
• Display the board

Now let’s have some fun implementing these features! Note that, as we go, we may find places where we need to add state, or create some helper functions. We’ll see!

There It Is

There It Is

Cool! You designed and implemented your first interesting Kotlin class. That was fun! Don’t worry—you’ll get a lot more practice.

More Practice

Need more practice? Head over to the practice page.