Object-Oriented Design is one of the most poorly understood paradigms in the world, even as almost all modern programming languages today embrace this paradigm. This course goes beyond an academic discussion of Object-Oriented Design, into a deep discussion of its effects on practical software engineering concerns such as maintainability, testability and reuse.

The course then proceeds to discuss critical Java best practices which affect performance and correctness. It then discusses the modern software engineering approaches of Test-Driven Development and Refactoring, which improve the quality and maintainability of the codebase. Students are provided with numerous hands-on graded and ungraded exercises, the most challenging of which is the final machine problem.

The course culminates in a code review of the machine problem. Students present their solution to a machine problem, and their work is critiqued by the instructor as well as the rest of the class, on the basis of Object-Oriented Design principles and Java Best Practices. The code review has been an effective means of driving home the lessons discussed over the past few days.