Hi,

Let's say I have the following class hierarchy:

class Base
{
  protected:

    virtual void foo() = 0;

    friend class Other;
};

class Derived : public Base
{
  protected:

    void foo() { /* Some implementation */ };
};

class Other
{
  public:

    void bar()
    {
      Derived* a = new Derived();

      a->foo(); // Compiler error: foo() is protected within this context
    };
};

I guess I could change it too a->Base::foo() but since foo() is pure virtual in the Base class, the call will result in calling Derived::foo() anyway.

However, the compiler seems to refuse a->foo(). I guess it is logical, but I can't really understand why. Am I missing something ? Can't (shouldn't) it handle this special case ?

Thank you.