[the__alchemist]

Like unclad, I disagree that not having private fields is a problem. I think this comes down to programming style. For an OOP style (Just one example), I can see how that would be irritating. Here's my anecdote:

I write a lot of rust. By default, fields are private. It's rare to see a field in my code that omits the `pub` prefix. I sometimes start with private because I forget `pub`, but inevitably I need to make it public!

I like in principle they're there, but in practice, `pub` feels like syntactic clutter, because it's on all my fields! I think this is because I use structs as abstract bags of data, vice patterns with getters/setters.

When using libraries that rely on private fields, I sometimes have to fork them so I can get at the data. If they do provide a way, it makes the (auto-generated) docs less usable than if the fields were public.

I suspect this might come down to the perspective of application/firmware development vice lib development. The few times I do use private fields have been in libs. E.g. if you have matrix you generate from pub fields and similar.

[pjmlp]

One the key principles for modular software is encapsulation, it predates OOP by decades, and at least even C got that correct.