Access controls in Swift

Ans : 

Access controls keyword enables you to hide the implementation details of your code, and to specify a preferred interface through which that code can be accessed and used.

Swift 3, Swift 4

There are 5 access controls.
1. open (most accessible, least restrictive)
2. public
3. internal (default)
4. fileprivate
5. private (least accessible, more restrictive)

1. open : It enable entity to be used in and outside of defining module and also other module. UIButton, UITableView is in UIKit. We import UIKit and make subclass of UITableView and use in our module in which we have imported UIKit. So tableview subclass of UITableView defined in UIKit is used in our module. Sot it is accessible in our module.

open class UITableView : UIScrollView, NSCoding { }

2. public : open allows us to subclass from another module. public allows us to subclass or override from within module in which it defined.

//module X
public func A(){}
open func B(){}

//module Y
override func A(){} // error
override func B(){} // success

So open class and class members can be accessible and overridden in which it is defined and also in which module it is imported.
public class and class members can be accessible and overridden only in which it is defined.


3. internal : Internal classes and members can be accessed anywhere within the same module(target) they are defined. You typically use internal-access when defining an app’s or a framework’s internal structure.

4. fileprivate : Restricts the use of an entity to its defining file. It is used to hide implementation details when details are used in entire file. fileprivate method is only accessible from that swift file in which it is defined.

5. private : Restricts the use of an entity to the enclosing declaration and to extension of that swift file or class. It is used to hide single block implementation. private entity can be accessible in swift 4 but it gives error in swift 3.