You can still create modules in zig, just use the standard handle pattern as you might in c/c++. I think that many of us have worked in “large company”, and the issue you describe is not resolved with the “private” keyword. You need to make your “component/module” with a well defined boundary (normally dll/library), a “public interface” and the internals not visible as symbols.

That doesn’t save you in languages that support reflection, but it will with zig. Inside a module, all private does is declare intent.

In languages with code inheritance, I think inheritance across module boundaries is now widely viewed as the anti-pattern that it is.