Path: csiph.com!fu-berlin.de!uni-berlin.de!individual.net!not-for-mail
From: Ian Collins <ian-news@hotmail.com>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++
Subject: Re: About getters/setters
Date: Fri, 23 Aug 2019 16:17:00 +1200
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On 23/08/2019 10:09, Tim Rentsch wrote:
> JiiPee <no@notvalid.com> writes:
> 
> [some white space reformatting done]
> 
>> Which one is better:  1)
>>
>>      class Person {
>>        public:
>>          int getAge() { return age;}
>>          void setAge(int a) { age = a;}
>>        private:
>>          int age;
>>      };
>>
>> or  2)
>>
>>      struct Person {
>>          int age;
>>      };
>>
>> ####
>>
>> I know Herb Sutter recommended 1) but for example isocpp
>>
>> https://isocpp.github.io/CppCoreGuidelines/CppCoreGuidelines#Rh-get
>>
>> seems to recommend 2). [...]
>>
>> I do currently 1) but wondering which way to go.
>>
>> Like now I have a "Settings" class.  Simple data members.  I started
>> adding getters and setters....
> 
> I agree with Herb Sutter's recommendation that (assuming the
> class or struct has some member functions) data members should
> never be public.  There are cases where for data members might
> plausibly be made protected rather than private, but never
> public.

There is a case where a data member is safe to be public:  a const data 
member.  Access to such a member cannot change a class's invariants.

-- 
Ian.