Description Susan McCourt 2006-09-14 15:14:03 EDT

Using I20060912-0800, WinXP, j2re1.4.2_08
I have two different cases where accessing a protected method from an inner class, an IAdaptable, behave inconsistently.  SCENARIO ONE causes an IllegalAccessError and the other does not.  I'm not sure if the inconsistency itself is a problem, or if I'm missing some subtle difference.  Note that the examples may not necessarily be released to HEAD, as we were working off patches in bug #154779.

SCENARIO ONE:
Inside a class "AddMarkerAction" I create the following IAdaptable which is accessed and run from another class that was passed the adaptable:

PlatformUI.getWorkbench().getOperationSupport().getOperationHistory().execute
(op, null, new IAdaptable() {
   public Object getAdapter(Class clazz) {
      if (clazz == Shell.class && getTextEditor() != null) {
         return getTextEditor().getSite().getShell();
      }
      return null;
   }
});

Note that the getAdapter method contains a reference to a protected method in the outer class.  The method is getTextEditor().  So when the
adaptable's getAdapter(...) method is run, I get this stack trace:

!ENTRY org.eclipse.ui 4 0 2006-09-13 11:38:46.315
!MESSAGE tried to access method
org.eclipse.ui.texteditor.TextEditorAction.getTextEditor()Lorg/eclipse/ui/texteditor/ITextEditor;
from class org.eclipse.ui.texteditor.AddMarkerAction$1
!STACK 0
java.lang.IllegalAccessError: tried to access method
org.eclipse.ui.texteditor.TextEditorAction.getTextEditor()Lorg/eclipse/ui/texteditor/ITextEditor;
from class org.eclipse.ui.texteditor.AddMarkerAction$1
        at
org.eclipse.ui.texteditor.AddMarkerAction$1.getAdapter(AddMarkerAction.java:136)
        at
org.eclipse.ui.internal.operations.AdvancedValidationUserApprover.getShell(AdvancedValidationUserApprover.java:390)

I can avoid this error by using the following code instead:

final ITextEditor editor = getTextEditor();
PlatformUI.getWorkbench().getOperationSupport().getOperationHistory().execute
(op, null, new IAdaptable() {
   public Object getAdapter(Class clazz) {
      if (clazz == Shell.class && editor != null) {
         return editor.getSite().getShell();
      }
      return null;
   }
});


SCENARIO TWO:
Similar situation in a different class, MarkerRulerAction.  The code is as follows:

PlatformUI.getWorkbench().getOperationSupport().getOperationHistory().execute
(operation, null, new IAdaptable() {
   public Object getAdapter(Class clazz) {
      if (clazz == Shell.class && getTextEditor() != null) {
         return getTextEditor().getSite().getShell();
      }
      return null;
   }
});

The getTextEditor() method is also protected in this class.  However, when the adaptable is run, there is no IllegalAccessError.  I put breakpoints in the code in both cases and stepped through to make sure the code was reached.

Questions:
Q1- If the first case is illegal, shouldn't the compiler have caught it?
Q2- Why wouldn't the second case be illegal?

The only difference I can observe is that in case 1, the protected method is inherited from a superclass of the outer class creating the adaptable.  And in case 2, the protected method is directly implemented in the outer class creating the adaptable.