Re: Help understanding Apple's approach in documentation a little better.
Re: Help understanding Apple's approach in documentation a little better.
- Subject: Re: Help understanding Apple's approach in documentation a little better.
- From: Ken Thomases <email@hidden>
- Date: Sun, 16 Aug 2015 16:35:25 -0500
On Aug 16, 2015, at 4:18 PM, Alex Zavatone <email@hidden> wrote:
> On Aug 16, 2015, at 4:49 PM, Ken Thomases wrote:
>
>> On Aug 16, 2015, at 3:09 PM, Alex Zavatone <email@hidden> wrote:
>>
>>> Why isn't it in Apple's documentation for storyboards?
>>
>> Because these are private implementation details. They are subject to change without notice. You can't rely on them in any shipping code.
>
> If they were private shouldn't there be a naming convention that states they are private?
No, there's no naming convention for properties to indicate they are private.
> If I look at an instance of a storyboard object in the Variables View in the Debugger, I can expand the object and they are all listed.
And? You've already shown they are visible in the runtime's information about the class. It's not surprising that the debugger also has access to this information.
> Is there some sort of naming or visual convention that communicates "you might be see these, but they're private and not for you to mess with"?
No.
> As soon as I saw them exposed by the runtime tool, and I saw that expanding the storyboard instance exposed them, I thought that the docs and header files were hiding information that was accessible.
They are "accessible" through these (and probably other) mechanisms, but that doesn't mean they are _appropriate_ to access. Working with the frameworks or a library is always subject to a design contract. There are plenty of times when it's _possible_ to do something but, if the design contract doesn't specifically allow it, it's disallowed. Accessing private properties is just a particular case of this general rule.
> Is there anything that shows that they are private?
Their non-presence in the documentation and headers.
Regards,
Ken
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