Hey all, I often run into this situation in OOP. A base class implements a method, such as: 
sub X {
   my $self = shift @_;
   ...
   $self->_Private_X();
   ...
}

[download]
Where method X() handles most of some functionality, but i want children to be able to override part of the behaviour with _Private_X(). But the base class often doesnt need a _Private_X().

So, i see 2 different (clean) ways to do this, one where this base class has a 'dummy' _Private_X(), which doesnt do anything, and the other is by modifying the X() method as follows: 
sub X {
   my $self = shift @_;
   ...
   if ( $self->can('_Private_X') ) {
      $self->_Private_X();
   }
   ...
}

[download]
Either way does the job, today im leaning towards the can() way of doing things.

Does anyone have any particular reasons to do this either way? Or some other way?

In reply to overridden method - best way by shemp

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