How can I access private members from nested class

[Stefan Jankovic]

Hi,

I came across this:

*Both Inner classes can access even private fields and methods of outer class
*Also the Outer class have access to private fields and methods of inner classes

---

First bullet point is clear because of lexical scoping. But how is it possible with second bullet point? I tried and it didn't work. For example:

public class Test {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Parent.Child child = new Parent().new Child();
        String name = child.name; //compiles
        int age = child.age; // compile error (age has private access)
    }
}

class Parent {
    class Child {
        public String name;
        private int age;
    }
}

If those bullet points were correct (to be exact 2nd one), shouldn't this work fine?

Thanks

[Stephan van Hulst]

Welcome to CodeRanch!

The second point says that you can access private fields of an inner class from the outer class.

Where in Parent are you accessing Child.age?

[Mike Savvy]

I think you would need a getter for private variable

[Stefan Jankovic]

You are totally right. I realize my mistake now