It's all in the title.
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A:
The fields are still there. Primitive fields use the memory they need (e.g. 32 bits for ints), reference fields ("object pointers") take 32 bits even if they're null. The fields have to be there even if they're not actively used, because the compiler has no way to be sure whether someone is going to need them.
Joonas Pulakka
2010-03-26 05:00:31
Nit pick, there are rare cases where it would be theoretically possible to prove that the fields are not needed; i.e. if the fields are all private, and all the constructors / methods that access them are not used / overridden in the subclass. But this is so rare that it is not worth addressing. (Besides, there is still the issue of reflective access to the fields.)
Stephen C
2010-03-26 07:20:04
You're right, but reflection indeed renders access modifiers merely informative.
Joonas Pulakka
2010-03-26 07:26:56