Question

If the function needs access to private or protected data, do one of two things:

a) Use the "friend" keyword
b) Make the data public
c) Use the "const" keyword
d) Avoid using operator overloading

Answer 1

The 'friend' keyword allows a function to access private or protected data in C++, while making data public is generally not advised due to encapsulation breach. The 'const' keyword is not for access control, and operator overloading is not related to private data access.

Step-by-step explanation:

The question relates to how a function can access private or protected data members in C++ classes. There are several methods to do this, two of which are outlined in the question: using the "friend" keyword, which allows a particular external function or class to access the private/protected data, or altering the data member's accessibility by making it public, which is generally not recommended as it breaks encapsulation.

Option c) suggests using the "const" keyword, which is not directly related to accessing private or protected data but is instead used to indicate that the function does not modify the data. Option d) is related to operator overloading, which does not inherently solve the issue of data access but relates to defining custom behavior for operators when applied to class objects.

The preferred choice for a function to safely access private or protected data without breaking encapsulation is to use the "friend" keyword, or better yet, to provide public member functions (accessor methods) that allow controlled access to these data members.