Is there a way to override class variables in Java?

Question

class Dad
{
    protected static String me = \"dad\";

    public void printMe()
    {
        System.out.println(me);
    }
}

class Son extends Dad
{
    protected         


        

Answer 1

If you are going to override it I don't see a valid reason to keep this static. I would suggest the use of abstraction (see example code). :

     public interface Person {
        public abstract String getName();
       //this will be different for each person, so no need to make it concrete
        public abstract void setName(String name);
    }

Now we can add the Dad:

public class Dad implements Person {

    private String name;

    public Dad(String name) {
        setName(name);
    }

    @Override
    public final String getName() {
    return name;
    }

    @Override
    public final void setName(String name) {
        this.name = name;
    }
}

the son:

public class Son implements Person {

    private String name;

    public Son(String name) {
        setName(name);
    }

    @Override
    public final String getName() {
        return name;
    }

    @Override
    public final void setName(String name) {
        this.name = name;
    }
}

and Dad met a nice lady:

public class StepMom implements Person {

    private String name;

    public StepMom(String name) {
        setName(name);
    }

    @Override
    public final String getName() {
        return name;
    }

    @Override
    public final void setName(String name) {
        this.name = name;
    }
}

Looks like we have a family, lets tell the world their names:

public class ConsoleGUI {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        List family = new ArrayList();
        family.add(new Son("Tommy"));
        family.add(new StepMom("Nancy"));
        family.add(new Dad("Dad"));
        for (Person person : family) {
            //using the getName vs printName lets the caller, in this case the
            //ConsoleGUI determine versus being forced to output through the console. 
            System.out.print(person.getName() + " ");
            System.err.print(person.getName() + " ");
            JOptionPane.showMessageDialog(null, person.getName());
    }
}

}

System.out Output : Tommy Nancy Dad
System.err is the same as above(just has red font)
JOption Output:
Tommy then
Nancy then
Dad