Workaround to accomplish protected properties in Objective-C

Question

I\'ve been trying to find a workaround to declare @protected properties in Objective-C so only subclasses in the hierarchy can access them (read only, not write). I read that th

Answer 1

Import the protected header in the implementation only. e.g.

ClassB.h

#import "ClassA.h"
@interface ClassB : ClassA
@end

ClassB.m

#import "ClassA_protected.h"
@implementation ClassB
@end

And in a framework the protected header should be marked project so it is not included in the public headers of the framework. Apple usually use the suffix _Internal.h for their protected methods.

For init or overriding a lazy loaded get property you would need direct access to the @proteced ivar, however for your use it would be better to redeclare the property as readwrite instead then you can take advantage of any features of the setter, atomicity for example.