Interface functions are external, or no interfaces

[chriseth]

Suggestion by @pirapira :

Functions in interface contracts are external by default and functions cannot be anything else than external.

We have to make sure that it is still fine to override external interface functions with public functions in contracts.

[pirapira]

I would argue interfaces are not contracts, and their members have no visibilities.

When a contract inherits an interface, the contract's externally visible members are examined against the interface's members.

[pirapira]

Another good way (which I prefer) is to remove the interface keyword so that we do not need to choose a meaning of the word.

[axic]

I think it is a good idea to change the "visibility" to external and disallow visibility modifiers in interfaces. They are meant to describe what the ABI describes.

I am not in favour of removing the interface keyword.

[axic]

I would argue interfaces are not contracts

Would it make sense introducing a new keyword implements / supports for interfaces to dinstinguish between inheritance?

contract Nekot supports Token {}

[chriseth]

If we do that, I would vote for implements, although I'm not sure if this justifies another keyword to learn.

[axic]

Question is, should we force the external keyword be present or force that no keyword is present?

[fulldecent]

@pirapira further arguments on getting rid of the current interface keyword are at #3420.

[axic]

Question is, should we force the external keyword be present or force that no keyword is present?

Actually #3038 has implemented this for 0.5.0.

Just shows we need to create that 0.5.0 release sooner rather than later..

[fulldecent]

@chriseth I think we can mark this as closed because of #3038

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The second half of your original issue is duplicated here (and has a test case)

#3458

[axic]

Started implementing this.

[axic]

Realised that actually this was implemented already via #3038.