Why can't I inherit from int in C++?

Question

I\'d love to be able to do this:

class myInt : public int
{

};

Why can\'t I?

Why would I want to? Stronger typing. For example, I

Answer 1

No one has mentioned that C++ was designed to have (mostly) backwards compatibility with C, so as to ease the upgrade path for C coders hence struct defaulting to all members public etc.

Having int as a base class that you could override would fundamentally complicate that rule no end and make the compiler implementation hellish which if you want existing coders and compiler vendors to support your fledgling language was probably not worth the effort.