3.1 When to use virtual methods

Virtual methods are useful when you need a method to be sticky through a subclass-to-superclass pointer cast. In other words, use a virtual method when the method should be object specific at run-time, and not pointer-type specific at compile time.

In our example, a CISStudent object always take a test as a CIS Student. Regardless of the compile time context, a CISStudent object always uses the CISStudent::takeTest method.