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What are protected members?
The protected keyword specifies access to class members in the member-list up to the next access specifier ( public or private ) or the end of the class definition. Class members declared as protected can be used only by the following: Direct privately derived classes that also have private access to protected members.
When should I use protected?
Should you ever use protected member variables? Depends on how picky you are about hiding state. If you don’t want any leaking of internal state, then declaring all your member variables private is the way to go. If you don’t really care that subclasses can access internal state, then protected is good enough.
Can we access protected members?
Protected members in a class are similar to private members as they cannot be accessed from outside the class. But they can be accessed by derived classes or child classes while private members cannot.
What is a protected member function?
A protected member variable or function is very similar to a private member but it provided one additional benefit that they can be accessed in child classes which are called derived classes.
What is the difference between private members and protected members?
The class members declared as private can be accessed only by the functions inside the class. The class member declared as Protected are inaccessible outside the class but they can be accessed by any subclass(derived class) of that class.
Can protected members be inherited?
Its only difference occurs in fact with inheritance: When a class inherits another one, the members of the derived class can access the protected members inherited from the base class, but not its private members. With protected , all public members of the base class are inherited as protected in the derived class.
What is the difference between private and protected members of class?
Private members are accessible within the same class in which they are declared. Protected members are accessible within the same class and within the derived/sub/child class. Private members can also be accessed through the friend function. Protected members cannot be accessed through the friend function.