inner interface?

[jordan gong]

A top-level interface cannot be private or protected.
Can an inner interface be private or protected?
Thanks.

[Jane Griscti]

Hi Jordan,
An interface declared within a class can be 'private' or 'protected'. You cannot declare an 'inner interface' in an interface declaration.

class Outer{
  private interface InterfaceA{}   // ok
  protected interface InterfaceB{} // ok
}
interface Outer {
  private interface InterfaceA{}  // won't compile
}

Remember that all interface members are implicitly 'public', making it impossible to declare an interface inside an interface as 'private or protected'
Hope that helps.
------------------
Jane Griscti
Sun Certified Programmer for the Java� 2 Platform