Protected in subclasses

[Imad Aydarooos]

My question is written in the code below

package pkgA;
//This from A programmers guide to SCJP by Khalid A. Mughal and Rolf W. Rasmussen, but edited by me
public class Alpha{
	protected int x;
}

/////////////////////////////////////////

package pkgB;
import pkgA.*;
public class Beta extends Alpha{
	public void checkProtect(Beta bobj, Gamma gobj){
		x =10;
		System.out.println(x);
		System.out.println(bobj.x);
		System.out.println(gobj.x);
	}
	public static void main(String[] args){
		Beta bobj = new Beta();
		Gamma gobj = new Gamma();
		bobj.checkProtect(bobj, gobj);
		gobj.checkProtect(bobj, gobj);\\ (1) why Gamma object will work in the Beta Class
	}
}
class Gamma extends Beta{
	public void checkProtect(Beta bobj, Gamma gobj){
		x =10;
		System.out.println(x);
	\\System.out.println(bobj.x); (2) But the Beta object will give this error(.\pkgB\Beta.java:21: x has protected access in pkgA.Alpha) in the Gamma class 
		System.out.println(gobj.x);
	}
}

But after checking i figured out the following:
1- Gamma object IS A Beta, so it can access the protected inherted member x.
2- Beta object IS NOT A Gamma, but Gamma has A Beta, in this case protected members are not visible to the composed object which is Beta object.

please elaborate on this and correct me if I'm wrong

Regards

[Seetharaman Venkatasamy]

look for section 6.6.7 here

and to confuse you , what happened if Alpha's protected x would have been marked as static? remember protected makes sense if it is defined before instance variable/method.

[Bharath Raja]

Please remember, protected modifier can have accessible within the package only. If you want to use that variable then leave it as default modifier

[Imad Aydarooos]

Bharath Raja wrote:Please remember, protected modifier can have accessible within the package only. If you want to use that variable then leave it as default modifier

This is not true Bharath Raja , the above code will compile and output:
10
10
0
10
10
which is a proof that your statment is not true

[Bharath Raja]

Imad Aydarooos wrote:

Bharath Raja wrote:Please remember, protected modifier can have accessible within the package only. If you want to use that variable then leave it as default modifier

This is not true

oops.. sorry for that... default is only strict package level access