Upcasting and Downcasting

In this problem, you will create a program that reads an animal type from Scanner, creates the appropriate object, calls methods after upcasting, and performs safe downcasting using instanceof, displaying the result to standard output.

Learning Objective: Understand the behavior and safe usage of reference type upcasting and downcasting

Overview

Upcasting converts child to parent type (implicit). Downcasting converts parent to child type (explicit). Using instanceof before downcasting is safe practice.

Specifications

• Read one line from Scanner: the animal type ("Dog", "Cat", or "Animal")
• Define getType() method in Animal class
• Define getType() and fetch() methods in Dog class
• Define getType() and meow() methods in Cat class
• Assign the appropriate object to an Animal variable (upcast)
• Demonstrate getType() after upcast and instanceof-based downcast

Input Format

animal type ("Dog", "Cat", or "Animal")

Output Format

• Print Type: [return value of getType()]
• If Dog: print Fetching!
• If Cat: print Meowing!
• Otherwise: print Unknown type

Input/Output Example

Input:

Dog

Output:

Type: Dog
Fetching!