Hi, I am currently rewatching the second part of Mastering Java and I came across the word implementation detail a few times. I was wondering if anyone could explain its meaning and what it does. Thanks in advance.
Thatās a good question. I think āimplementation detailā just means āhow something is coded/implementedā. But I usually hear it in sentences like āthis is using a linked list under the hood, but thatās just an implementation detailā, meaning itās not really that important to the conversation to know exactly how it is implemented.
An important distinction about an āimplementation detailā is that it could change in the future. So the user of some class does not (or rather should not) care about an implementation detail because it should be completely hidden by good encapsulation. A future version of the class could do something completely different (after some refactoring) and the class should still āworkā as intended.