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8. Friend Function

A friend function in C++ is defined outside a class but can access its private and protected members. It can be a standalone function, function template, or a member function, and can also include entire classes as friends. The document provides an example of declaring a friend function and demonstrates its usage in a program that prints the width of a box.

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13 views

8. Friend Function

A friend function in C++ is defined outside a class but can access its private and protected members. It can be a standalone function, function template, or a member function, and can also include entire classes as friends. The document provides an example of declaring a friend function and demonstrates its usage in a program that prints the width of a box.

Uploaded by

kranokmusic
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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C++ Friend Functions

A friend function of a class is defined outside that class' scope but it has the right to
access all private and protected members of the class. Even though the prototypes for
friend functions appear in the class definition, friends are not member functions.
A friend can be a function, function template, or member function, or a class or class
template, in which case the entire class and all of its members are friends.
To declare a function as a friend of a class, precede the function prototype in the class
definition with keyword friend as follows −
class Box {
double width;

public:
double length;
friend void printWidth( Box box );
void setWidth( double wid );
};
To declare all member functions of class ClassTwo as friends of class ClassOne, place
a following declaration in the definition of class ClassOne −
friend class ClassTwo;
Consider the following program −

#include <iostream>

using namespace std;

class Box {
double width;

public:
friend void printWidth( Box box );
void setWidth( double wid );
};

// Member function definition


void Box::setWidth( double wid ) {
width = wid;
}

// Note: printWidth() is not a member function of any class.


void printWidth( Box box ) {
/* Because printWidth() is a friend of Box, it can
directly access any member of this class */
cout << "Width of box : " << box.width <<endl;
}

// Main function for the program


int main() {
Box box;

// set box width without member function


box.setWidth(10.0);

// Use friend function to print the wdith.


printWidth( box );

return 0;
}

When the above code is compiled and executed, it produces the following result −
Width of box : 10

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