This is an interesting idea, and one I thought about. But, I rejected it because this would require that the base class knows about the child classes, even if it's only the names. A goal for OO is that no-one knows anything more than they absolutely have to. Have a class know something about its children is, generally, a no-no. *shrugs*

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We are the carpenters and bricklayers of the Information Age.

Don't go borrowing trouble. For programmers, this means Worry only about what you need to implement.