Cannot display the value of protected internal variable

[mp3909]

I have this code in Assembly1:

using System;
using sample;

namespace ConsoleApp1
{
    class Test:Customers
    {
        public void Display()
        {
            Console.WriteLine(a);
        }
    }
    class Program
    {
        static void Main()
        {
            Test t = new Test();
            t.Display();
            Console.ReadLine();
        }
    }
}

Then in a different assembly (i.e. Assembly2) I have this code.

using System;
namespace sample
{
    public class Customers
    {
        protected internal int a = 10;
    }
    class Program
    {
        static void Main()
        {
        }
    }
}

Assembly1 has a reference to Assembly2.
When I run the code in Assembly1, the output is blank whereas I thought it would display the value of "a" which is 10.
Why is it not working?

 

[jmcilhinney]

Do you know what the 'internal' keyword is for? Presumably you are using it for a reason. What is that reason? If you don't know what it's for, you should probably start by reading the documentation:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/csharp/language-reference/keywords/internal

The third sentence there answers your question directly:

Internal types or members are accessible only within files in the same assemblyy

 

[mp3909]

Yes but I am using "protected" internal so it should be accessible from assemblies outside of the assembly that contains the member

 

[jmcilhinney]

Ah, good point. I'm not sure that I have ever used both before and I was thinking that their behaviour was ANDed but it is indeed ORed.

I just created a solution with two projects - a Console App and a Class Library - and copied and pasted your code and it worked as expected for me, i.e. displayed 10 in the console window.

 

[mp3909]

Oh, I was creating a solution with two projects - a Console App and a Console App - no Class Library.
Could that explain why it wan not working for me?

 

[jmcilhinney]

Quite possibly. It doesn't make sense to create two applications. Applications don't reference each other. Reusable code goes in a library. That library can then be referenced by another library or an application.