Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sun-barr!lll-winken!sundance.llnl.gov!jac
From: jac@sundance.llnl.gov (James Crotinger)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++
Subject: Re: friend access to base class members ???
Keywords: friend, inheritance
Message-ID: <69720@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV>
Date: 13 Oct 90 04:49:37 GMT
References: <811@orthogo.UUCP>
Sender: usenet@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV
Distribution: comp
Organization: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Lines: 29

In article <811@orthogo.UUCP> basti@orthogo.UUCP (Sebastian Wangnick) writes:
>My compiler allows member functions to access member variables
>of other objects with the same class, too!?
>
>More problematically, shouldn't friends be allowed to access
>protected: base class members the same way as members can?
>

  I think the first idea, that member functions should only be
able to access the private members belonging to *this, would be
much too severe a restriction. Objects of the same class by definition
know about eachother's representations and should be able to use
that knowledge to their advantage, for efficiency reasons, etc. 
If you want to make sure that an one object doesn't missuse that
knowledge, prototype the member functions accordingly (to take
const references, etc.). 

  The second point is, I think, a bug in 1.2. Was this fixed in 2.0?

>
>Sebastian Wangnick (basti@orthogo.uucp)

  Jim

--
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James A. Crotinger   Lawrence Livermore Nat'l Lab // The above views 
jac@gandalf.llnl.gov P.O. Box 808;  L-630     \\ // are mine and are not 
(415) 422-0259       Livermore CA  94550       \\/ necessarily those of LLNL.