C++ subclassing access modifier? - c++

Question

I'm C++ newbie, and I have many years of experience about OO languages such as C/C#/Objective-C. Now, I'm learning C++.
I saw this C++ code:
class World : public State
{
};
It seems class World inherits the class State publicly.
Public subclassing? It's hard to understand.
What's the concept of this feature?
And when is this useful or required?

Answer 1

The need for the public keyword there is just that for classes defined with the keyword class, the default access modifier (for everything - data members, member functions, and base classes) is private. So
class World : State {};
is the same as:
class World : private State {};
and that's probably not what you want - it means that the base class is only accessible within the class World. Outsiders "don't know" that the inheritance is there at all.
For classes defined with the keyword struct, the default access modifier is public, so you could write:
struct World : State {};
and get something that both looks and behaves a bit like every other language with inheritance. But the struct keyword, and the fact that it defines a class, is really only there for compatibility with C. You won't find many C++ style guides that recommend using it just in order to get the default public accessibility - generally it's used only for classes which are POD, or perhaps only for classes with no member functions at all.
As for why C++ has private inheritance in the first place: for most purposes, private inheritance is a form of composition. Normal composition:
class World {
State state;
public:
void foo() {
state.bar();
state.baz();
and so on
}
};
That is, the class World knows that it's implemented using a State, and the outside world doesn't know how World is implemented.
vs.
class World : private State {
public:
void foo() {
bar();
baz();
and so on
}
};
That is, the class World knows that it's implemented by being a State, and the outside world doesn't know how it's implemented. But you can selectively expose parts of the interface of State by for example putting using State::bar; in the public part of World's definition. The effect is as if you'd laboriously written a function (or several overloads) in World, each of which delegates to the same function on State.
Other than avoiding typing, though, one common use of private inheritance is when the class State is empty, i.e. has no data members. Then if it's a member of World it must occupy some space (admittedly, depending on the object layout this might be space that otherwise would just be padding, so it doesn't necessarily increase the size of World), but if it's a base class then a thing called the "empty base class optimization" kicks in, and it can be zero-size. If you're creating a lot of objects, this might matter. Private inheritance enables the optimization, but the outside world won't infer an "is-a" relationship, because it doesn't see the inheritance.
It's a pretty fine difference - if in doubt just use explicit composition. Introducing inheritance to save typing is all very well until it has some unexpected consequence.

Answer 2

In case
class World: private State
{
};
private inheritance means that all public and protected members of State would be inherited by World and would become private. This seals State inside World. No class that inherits from World will be able access any features of State.

Answer 3

What makes you think that it's private? It says public right there, which means it is publically subclassing.
That aside, what private and protected inheritance do is the same as public inheritance, except that all the member variables are functions are inherited with at least private or protected accessibility. For example, if State had a public member function 'foo()', it would be private in 'World'.
This is rarely used in practice, but it does have purpose. The most common use that I've seen is composition through inheritance. i.e. you want a "has a" relationship rather than an "is a" (that you usually get with public inheritance). By privately inheriting the class, you get all its variables and methods, but you don't expose them to the outside world.
One advantage of using private inheritance for composition comes from the empty base class optimisation (EBCO). Using normal composition, having a member object of an empty class would still use at least 1 byte because all variables must have a unique address. If you privately inherit the object you want to be composed of then that doesn't apply and you won't suffer memory loss.
e.g.
class Empty { };
class Foo
{
int foo;
Empty e;
};
class Bar : private Empty
{
int foo;
};
Here, sizeof(Foo) will probably be 5, but sizeof(Bar) will be 4 because of the empty base class.

Answer 4

The public/protected/private keyword before the name of the ancestor class indicates the desired visibility of members from the ancestor. With private inheritance, the descendant inherits only the implementation from the ancestor, but not the interface.
class A {
public:
void foo();
};
class B : private A {
public:
void bar();
};
void B::bar()
{
foo(); // can access foo()
}
B b;
b.foo(); // forbidden
b.bar(); // allowed
In general, you should use public inheritance because inheritance shouldn't be used for implementation re-use only (which is what private inheritance does).