A
class in
C++ is a user defined type or data structure declared with keyword
class that has data and functions (also called methods) as its members whose access is governed by the three access specifiers
private,
protected or
public (by default access to members of a class is
private). A class (declared with keyword
class) in C++ differs from a structure (declared with keyword
struct) as by default, members are
private in a class while they are
public in a structure. The private members are not accessible outside the class; they can be accessed only through methods of the class. The public members form an interface to the class and are accessible outside the class. Instances of these data types are known as
objects and can contain
member variables,
constants,
member functions, and
overloaded operators defined by the programmer.