What is a good example to differentiate between fileprivate and private in Swift3

fileprivate is now what private used to be in earlier Swift releases: accessible from the same source file. A declaration marked as private can now only be accessed within the lexical scope it is declared in. So private is more restrictive than fileprivate.

As of Swift 4, private declarations inside a type are accessible to extensions of the same type if the extension is defined in the same source file.

Example (all in one source file):

class A {
    private func foo() {}
    fileprivate func bar() {}

    func baz() {
        foo()
        bar()
    }
}

extension A {
    func test() {
        foo() // Swift 3: error: use of unresolved identifier 'foo'
              // Swift 4: no error because extension is in same source file
        bar()
    }
}

let a = A()
a.foo() // error: 'foo' is inaccessible due to 'private' protection level
a.bar()
  • The private foo method is accessible only within the scope of the class A { ... } definition. It is not even accessible from an extension to the type (in Swift 3, see the second note below for changes in Swift 4).

  • The file-private bar method is accessible from the same source file.

Notes:

  1. The proposal SE-0159 – Fix Private Access Levels suggested to revert to the Swift 2 semantics in Swift 4. After a lengthy and controversial discussion on the swift-evolution mailing list, the proposal was rejected.

  2. The proposal SE-0169 – Improve Interaction Between private Declarations and Extensions suggests to make private declarations inside a type accessible to extensions of the same type if the extension is defined in the same source file. This proposal was accepted and implemented in Swift 4.


I just draw a diagram about private, fileprivate, open and public

Hope it can quickly help you , for text description please refer to Martin R 's answer

[ Update Swift 4, 5 ]

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Updated for Swift 5

Private vs FilePrivate

For better clarity paste the code snippet in Playground

class Sum1 {
    let a: Int!
    let b: Int!
    private var result: Int?
    fileprivate var resultt: Int?

    init(a : Int, b: Int) {
        self.a = a
        self.b = b
    }

    func sum(){
        result = a + b
        print(result as! Int)
    }
}

let aObj = Sum1.init(a: 10, b: 20)
aObj.sum()
aObj.resultt //File Private Accessible as inside same swift file
aObj.result //Private varaible will not be accessible outside its definition except extensions

extension Sum1{

    func testing() {

        // Both private and fileprivate accessible in extensions
        print(result)
        print(resultt)
    }
}

//If SUM2 class is created in same file as Sum1 ---
class Sum2{

    func test(){

        let aSum1 = Sum1.init(a: 2, b: 2)
        // Only file private accessible
        aSum1.resultt

    }
}

Note: Outside of Swift file both private and fileprivate are not accessible.