Question

I’m playing around with namespaces and faced a problem I can’t really understand.

My namespace structure in a given class library is as follows:

Namespace History
Namespace History.Antiquity
Namespace History.Antiquity.East
Namespace History.Antiquity.West

When inside the source file that declares the namespace History, I can’t use any of the types defined under History.Antiquity.East or History.Antiquity.West without fully qualifying them, or without qualifying them starting with “Antiquity”.

Example Code:

The following for instance, gives me a compile-time error (assuming the type “Persia” is defined in History.Antiquity.East):

using History.Antiquity;

namespace History
{
    public class foo
    {
        public foo()
        {
            East.Persia.Conquer(); // error!
        }
    }

} 

I need to either fully qualify Persia, or qualify it starting from Antiquity. Alternatively, I can introduce an alias:

using East = History.Antiquity.East;

Actual question:

What I can’t seem to understand is why is there a problem with this namespace structure. How can it be that .Net finds it conflicting?

Answer 1

You have to open a namespace in order to see it’s types in C#. Types from sub-namesapces are not automatically visible. So, put the following on top of your code file:

using History.Antiquity.East;

Then you can directly access your type as follows:

Persia.Conquer();

By the way, your code samples look like a mixture of VB, C# and C++/CLI… what language are you actually using?