Evaluating Eiffel As A Foundation Language For An OO-Centric Curriculum

Abstract

The principles of object technology are todaycentral to computer science, software engineering andrelated curricula in academia. Research in pedagogyincreasingly emphasizes the teaching of principles, asapplied to problem solving in the general, rather than thespecifics of any particular programming languageimplementing the ideas. However, the importance of alanguage in teaching principles cannot be underestimated.The appropriateness of a chosen language, in comparisonwith other competing choices is perhaps a criticalconsideration, but one that must be made against an explicitstatement of the goals and objectives of curricula centeredon OO principles. With the goals, objectives and principlesoutlined, we review the limitations of the current dominantlanguage choices; namely Java and C++. We then evaluateEiffel, The language, against the same principles and outlinethe benefits of its adoption as the foundation language incurricula centered on OO technology.

Index Terms - Eiffel, Language, Object Technology (OT),OO Concepts & Principles, OO curriculum.