[swift-evolution] [Accepted] SE-0169: Improve Interaction Between `private` Declarations and Extensions

[Xiaodi Wu]

On Sat, Apr 22, 2017 at 11:51 AM, Jose Cheyo Jimenez via swift-evolution <
swift-evolution at swift.org> wrote:

>
>
> On Apr 21, 2017, at 8:41 PM, BJ Homer via swift-evolution <
> swift-evolution at swift.org> wrote:
>
> The "Access Control" section of the Swift 3 book says the following:
>
> You can mark an extension with an explicit access-level modifier (for
> example, private extension) to set a *new default access level* for all
> members defined within the extension.
>
> The behavior of "private extension" in Swift 3 was a deviation from that
> model, justified because "private" as a default would have meant that
> nothing in the extension could ever be called. But it was still contrary to
> the model suggested by the Swift documentation.
>
> Given the highly restrictive behavior of "private" in Swift 3 and the
> documentation quoted above, it seems unlikely that a developer would
> intentionally use "private extension" to mean "please make all this stuff
> visible to the entire file"—it would have worked, but it seems an odd way
> to write it. If that were the intention, I think "fileprivate extension"
> would have been more likely.
>
> I think the change to the behavior of "private extension" is in line with
> the model proposed by SE-0169, in line with the documented behavior of
> access control on extensions, and in line with user expectations.
> -BJ
>
>
> I understand your point. Another aspect of SE-0169 is that fileprivate
> should be more rare and thus meaningful when used. The current behavior
> stays true to the goal of making fileprivate rare.
>
> A top level private scope is effectively fileprivate so it is not totally
> weird for the extension members to inherit the top level private scope.
>
> When extensions gain the ability to contain properties, we should not
> allow the access level modifiers to the extensions in the same way protocol
> extensions prohibit its use.
>

That idea would be my preference too, but it has been already written up as
a proposal, considered, and rejected.
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