If you have done some Java and C# programming and come from a Java or C# background, you should be familiar with getter and setter methods or you may also know them as accessors and mutators, respectively. They are a fundamental pillar of good programming. Getters/setters or accessors/mutators, are also known as methods used in keeping the principle of encapsulation where member variables are made private to protect them from other code which could be potentially malicious, and the getter/setter acts as a gatekeeper or intermediary between the private member variable and other code. Take a look at the following lines of code:

public int getAge()
{
  return Age;
}
public void setAge(int _age)
{
  Age = _age
}

The preceding two methods should not be unfamiliar to you from a Java or C# perspective. Getters and setters can be considered bad if used improperly. Making a variable public and yet writing a getter and setter method is a good example as this violates the concept...