I was hoping somebody could help me with regards to understanding nested classes. For the most part, I understand the access attributes among enclosing, inner, and static classes however, I am having trouble with one. It's shown in the diagram on p.210 in my book that instance members of a non-static nested class can access static members of a fellow static nested class within the same top level class. Yet when I try to demonstrate this with a dummy program, I get a 'cannot resolve symbol' error because the static variable in the static nested class is not recognized in the non-static class from which I attempt to access it. Just so it's clear, I'm not creating an object of the static class in the non-static one first, and then, using the dot operator, try to gain access to the static variable, i.e. staticNestedClassObject.staticVariable -- rather, i'm trying to use the variable directly in the non-static class by accessing it simply as staticVariable.

I was hoping somebody could enlighten me if i've miss understood something and perhaps post a small snipet of code for me to look at that would make things clearer.

Thanx in advance -- S.N.

You cannot access staticVariable by just using the unqualified name. The compiler will be looking for staticVariable in the current nested class or in the enclosing class.To identify staticVariable properly you must qualify it with its class name e.g. ClassName.staticVariable.

hi,
 staticare members which are called class members, so they do not require object to access them.
private are class private members so a private member can not accessed any where out side class.
public it is the most loose attribute which allows that member to be accessed from anywhere.
protected only accessed by a child class.

if you want to access a static member, you can access it without the help of object of class.

in nested class if the inner class is static so it may be considered as a seperate class, so not referenced of outer class requires.
above is same like main which is an inner static member in a outer class.