Public/Private class

[corvenzo]

Hi,

I'm a pretty new Java student and I was just confused on a few basic concepts. What exactly is the difference between public and private classes and in which case would you use each one? also, what is a constructor, mutator, or accessor?

Thank you.

[NormR1]

Take a look at these pages:
[Link Anchor Text](http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/java/javaOO/classes.html

[stultuske]

a private class? maybe for inner classes, but I definitely wouldn't recommend it otherwise :)
I think you ment the access modifiers public-protected-private(-package) for the variables?

[JamesCherrill]

a private class? maybe for inner classes, but I definitely wouldn't recommend it otherwise :)

The all-important JLS section 8.1.1 says

The access modifiers protected and private (§6.6) pertain only to member classes within a directly enclosing class or enum declaration (§8.5).

For example you may have a class that represents a collection of Things that you will want to sort in various different orders. You create private member classes for the different Comparators that you use in your sorting.

[ash.28.88]

hi,
public amd private are the access modifire.This modifires are allowed on variables,methods and classes.
If we want to access a class anywhere then make this class as public using public keyword.
In the case PACKAGE,public class can be access within the same package or in the other package
But private class can't be access in the same package or in the other package.
Simply we say that public are write once and access anywhere but private can't.