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Inheriting Private Members in C++

The document discusses how to make a private member of a base class inheritable by declaring it as protected. A protected member can be accessed by member functions of its class and any derived classes, but not outside those classes. The access level of inherited members depends on the derivation type, with protected derivation making public and protected members protected in the derived class.

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Nithish Reddy
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35 views6 pages

Inheriting Private Members in C++

The document discusses how to make a private member of a base class inheritable by declaring it as protected. A protected member can be accessed by member functions of its class and any derived classes, but not outside those classes. The access level of inherited members depends on the derivation type, with protected derivation making public and protected members protected in the derived class.

Uploaded by

Nithish Reddy
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Making a private member inheritable

• Private member of a base class cannot be inherited.


• But it is possible to do so with the help of ‘protected’ access specifier.
• A member declared as protected is accessible by the member functions within its
class and any class immediately derived from it.
• It cannot be accessed by any other functions outside these two classes.
• When protected member is inherited in public mode, it becomes protected in the
derived class and is accessible by the member functions of the derived class, also
further inheritance is possible.
• When protected member is inherited in private mode, it becomes private in the
derived class and is accessible by the member functions of the derived class, but
further inheritance is impossible.
• In protected derivation, public and protected members become protected
class alpha
{
private: //optional
……. //visible to member functions within its class
……..
protected:
……. // visible to member functions of its on and derived class
……..
public:
……… //visible to all functions in the program
……..
};
Access Rights of Derived Classes
(or Visibility of inherited members )

Derived class visibility


Base class visibility
Example program
#include <iostream>
using namespace std;

class Base {
private:
int pvt = 1;

protected:
int prot = 2;

public:
int pub = 3;
int getPVT() // function to access private member
{
return pvt;
}
};
class ProtectedDerived : protected Base {
public:
int getProt() // function to access protected member from Base
{
return prot;
}

int getPub() // function to access public member from Base


{
return pub;
}
};

int main()
{
ProtectedDerived object1;
cout << "Private cannot be accessed." << endl;
cout << "Protected = " << object1.getProt() << endl;
cout << "Public = " << object1.getPub() << endl;
return 0;
}
OUTPUT

Private cannot be accessed.


Protected = 2
Public = 3

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