Functions with package protection

[Robert Fraser]

grauzone wrote:
>> Sorry to dig up this old post, but I still don't understand why 
>> 'package' functions cannot be virtual? Is there a good reason for 
>> this? I can't see why we can't use polymorphism on 'package' functions!
>>
>> Is there way to make it virtual without making it public? (e.g. a 
>> 'virtual' keyword?)
> 
> "package" needs to fixes:
> - package methods must be allowed to be virtual
> - package methods must be allowed to be accessed from sub packages 
> (module a.b.x should be able to access package identifiers declared in 
> module a.y)
> 
> I don't understand why these fixes applied, especially because they are 
> completely backward compatible.

"package methods must be allowed to be virtual" isn't 
backwards-compatible. This code will work differently if package methods 
were made virtual:

class A
{
	package void foo() { printf("A"); }
}

class B
{
	package void foo() { printf("B"); }
}

void main()
{
	A a = new B();
	a.foo();
}